Career Opportunities
Communicators Tell the Industry's Story Good and bad, technical information must be put in laymen's terms
RICHARD L. MOORE, Director, Public Relations, W. R. Grace & Co., New York, N.Y.
WANTED: A man with a c hemical background who can write. WANTED: A woman with a chemical degree who can work in a research lib rary and get the facts behind the facts. WANTED: A man for our public relations and advertising department who can interpret our company to the public because he understands the technical side of our company.
Years ago I took an aptitude test in high school and carefully directed my answers as though I wished to be a scientist. But the tests showed that I had the personality of a salesman even though I was "editing" my answers to make them sound like I wanted to be a budding Lavoisier. Somewhat discouraged, I went to my scientifically trained father and told him that instead of becoming a good chemist it appeared that I would be just great at selling real estate or life insurance. Therefore, perhaps I ought to forget all about studying chemistry in spite of the fact that this was a compelling desire on my part. The parental lecture that followed, as heretical as it may sound to those engaged in psychological aptitude testing, can be summed up as, "Some chemists like to fish and hunt, others like to dance until 3 A.M., still others like to listen to Bach and read Beowulf. Aptitude tests merely compare your pattern of interests to an average pattern established by men and women who have been successful in certain vocations, thereby indicating that you too might fit into a similar vocation." What my father meant was there are no set molds—chemists are just like anybody else. The point he failed to make was that a technical background can equip you for almost anything. In the past decade, an increasing number of employers have been looking for technically trained men and women to work in the broad field of information or communication services. They want writers with a chemical background, but good ones are hard to find and thus they command a premium. Steve Simpson, a chemical placement specialist at Fanning Personnel Agency in New York, who has inter26A
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viewed thousands of chemists looking for career opportunities, has this to say about positions for chemists in the field of communications: "There used to be a general impression among technical men that the field of communications was the domain of the unsuccessful technical man—if you couldn't make it on the bench try public relations, advertising, or technical writing. This," says Mr. Simpson, "is just not true!" Mr. Simpson adds, "Salary levels in the communications field are no longer second rate. In the past r\ye years there has been an appreciable recognition of the need for top talent, and salaries have moved up commensurately in most of the major companies so that they are on a par with the company's technical levels." Technical writing is the bridge between the laboratory and a company's public. It is no longer sufficient for a research program to be reported in a carefully bound volume which is duly sent to management and then filed in the appropriate archives. Today, research management knows that the technical writer must help transpose the long-haired technical findings into a readily understandable presentation. The writer must show the progress made to date and impress on those who hold the purse strings and pass on the next budget that what has happened so far is worthwhile and should be continued. Public
Relations
Even though public relations is a billion dollar industry, most college men and women do not think of a career in this field while they are attending classes. In all probability, the major reason for this lack of interest is the fact that public relations is almost too broad a term in itself to define the many splendid opportunities that are open to the collegian. A specialist could, in all probability, belong to a public relations department. So could a speech writer, an industrial photographer, an editor, a proofreader, a press contact man, and a community relations specialist, and many others. A public relations man is a communicator. He is a planner of programs and in today's corporate world an executor of many of these plans. He is the man who helps corporations answer the mail, the telephone, and the door-
bell. He is also the man who acts as the conscience of his organization in translating what his company is doing so that the public is aware that the company is putting emphasis on its public responsibility. He is the man who shows exactly what role the company is playing in confronting many issues—air and water pollution, public health, civic causes, conservation, automation, modern living, superannuation, and profits. How can a chemically trained man or woman fit into public relations as a career? Public relations needs thoughtful planners who are interested in communications. Practically everything made today is chemically oriented. Therefore, the technically trained individual who is interested in writing or speaking or communicating can interpret the scientific characteristics of his organization's products a great deal easier than someone who has never studied the fundamentals of valence or equilibriums. Suppose a liberal arts graduate joined a public relations organization and was assigned to prepare a press release on a new inorganic polymer that is a substitute for paper. He might be able to wring a satisfactory story out of the research laboratory after many agonizing hours —including the time of high-priced research workers. On the other hand, a technically trained man would be able to absorb the whole concept of the mechanism; he could view its relationship to other discoveries and advances in the field. The result: a more comprehensive story. Much of what has been said for public relations for the technically trained man also applies to the field of advertising. Many chemically trained men have entered this field and have made a huge success in ferreting out the facts about a product and putting them into understandable copy for trade and technical magazines as well as consumer publications. The advertising man who knows precisely what he is talking or writing about when it comes to the products he is helping to market is ahead of his counterpart who has to ask someone just what is the difference between high-density polymers and high-molecular-weight, long-chain molecules. Technical advertising has a great need for a person who is willing to research the facts and who has a strong enough foundation in science to know the language and make the strongest case for the marketing effort. Not too many years ago when one thought of a library he generally considered it to be a place built from funds from the Carnegie Foundation. The image of the librarian he conjured up was that of a steel-rimmed-glasses type wearing her grey hair in a bun. Today, even libraries in medium-sized towns and cities are mechanized. They have microfilm readers that can produce articles from most contemporary periodicals in a matter of minutes. The research library has not only mechanized itself in terms of modern equipment, but many now use computers and data processing in an effort to locate all of the information on a particular subject. The research librarian can be an individual trained in the sciences and holding advanced degrees. Today's librarians regard themselves not only as keepers and catalogers of books and periodicals but as information retrieval experts. Many technical libraries prefer to hire chemically trained personnel and then to train them in library science. Today's technical librarian is an essential element in the industrial research program. Before many investigations are begun in the laboratory, the research chemist goes to
the library and enlists the aid of librarians, who search all of the patent and technical journal literature on the particular subject that will later be explored. In many instances, foreign literature and patents are also reviewed so that the librarian must be knowledgeable in French, German, and Russian. Those interested in the growing field of information retrieval should be reasonably meticulous in working out details and have the imagination and resourcefulness to initiate and develop new approaches to tracking down all that has been published on a particular development or method of a chemical reaction. In the next few years, many large libraries will require scientists trained in the use of computers in data processing as automatic information retrieval comes to the forefront. The chemical industry has spawned many able communicators. Perhaps the best known of these men in the industry is the late Dr. Gustav Egloff, research director of Universal Oil Products Co. Not only was Dr. Egloff a prolific writer of technical articles—he authored or coauthored more than 650 articles—but 281 U.S. patents in petroleum chemistry bear his name as sole or joint inventor and one dozen attest to his contribution to the petroleum literature. In technical writing, inventing, and research, his record speaks for itself. As a public relations man he stands almost unequaled in the chemical industry. In lecturing about Dr. Egloff at the spring 1964 ACS meeting before the Division of History of Chemistry, Dr. Louis Schmerling said: "Egloff was the subject of much newspaper and magazine publicity because of his skill in supplying the press with interesting stories about important new technical developments in chemistry, in readily understandable language. Indeed, reporters looked forward to seeing him at meetings because they could be certain of a worthwhile story from him." Although Dr. Egloff was primarily a scientist, he was also the forerunner of the technically trained public relations man. Today, many technical societies, including the ACS, employ public relations men to interpret in a ham-and-eggs fashion the hundreds of scientific papers given at their technical meetings so that the working press will be able to get an "Egloffian" view of the proceedings. Many of the men who help to staff these organizations started out with a technical degree and they are much in demand because they can talk the language of the scientist in layman's terms.
Richard L. Moore is director of public relations for W. R. Grace 6- Co. He joined Grace after nine years as assistant treasurer and director of public relations, advertising, and personnel for Foster D. Snell, Inc. Mr. Moore attended Bucknell University and received a bachelor s degree in chemistry in 1946 and a master's degree in economics in 1947. He is currently a councilor of the American Chemical Society and a member of the public relations committee of the Manufacturing Chemists' Association. In addition, he is a past-chairman of the New York chapter of the American Institute of Chemists and holds membership in the Chemists' Club of New York, the National Association of Science Writers, and the Chemical Industry Association. MAY
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