How Much Communication Is Enough?

KKA discussed communications in institutions of education, the arts and culture with Marlies Krainz-Dürr, Mari Steindl and Christoph Thoma.

KKA: In recent years, the emergence of the social media has changed our communication behaviour. How would you assess this situation from the perspective of your organisation?

Marlies Krainz-Dürr: When the Universities of Teacher Education [Pädagogische Hochschulen, PH, formerly academies] were established in 2007, the following questions posed a great challenge: How do we introduce ourselves to the public and how do we communicate what we stand for? We developed a mission statement and instituted a public relations office. In the beginning, this was not an easy thing to do, because for an institution of education it was unusual. For example, we now have all our courses listed on our website, but we still use a printed catalogue, because that’s what the teachers want. We also have our own printed magazine, which we have ironically titled “PH Online”.

Mari Steindl: The Interkulturelles Zentrum is a small association, and we are not accustomed to having people listen to us as a matter of course. It always requires a great deal of effort on our part to get into the public eye. Five years ago we added a staff member to look after public relations. I think the public relations work at IZ has become very professional since then. It has taken on broader and more extensive forms. We now work more with partners in the business sector and this kind of cooperation places different requirements on our public presence.

Christoph Thoma: For me, marketing as well as press and public relations work are forms of cooperation. We can only function as a cultural institution if I think in terms of networking. Of course, Grazer Spielstätten uses tools such as video and the new media, but we still do so far too little. I have now hired someone who will be responsible for public relations work through the social media. We will recoup the costs of this; we just have make sure the work is done professionally.

Marlies Krainz-Dürr: As an educational institution, we consider our main focus to be in the area of research and teaching. For this reason, we often hear the criticism: “What! Now we’ve hired another person for ICT¹ support!” But dealing with the social media is something that has to be learned. And I am not sure whether it makes sense to subject ourselves too much to media overkill.

Christoph Thoma: I don’t consider social networks to be overkill, I see them as information platforms. The Universities of Teacher Education train teachers, and you certainly have to offer media training, too.

Marlies Krainz-Dürr: Of course we utilise Internet platforms for communication and learning. That works up to a point, but it isn’t a substitute for phases of personal attendance. In my opinion, the discussions in the Net are not an efficient form of communication, but only serve as platforms for self-expression.

Mari Steindl: Nevertheless, I would say that social networks are meaningful forms of communication. The central point is that we have to learn to deal with them in a way that suits our purposes.

Christoph Thoma: It’s always a question of: What is private? What is professional? Where are the overlaps? When I see what I learn today by using the social media, the information I obtain, the tools that are available, then I just have to take advantage of it all. I believe that institutions of education also have to jump onto this bandwagon, because that’s the direction in which society is headed. Young people are growing up with the social networks.

Marlies Krainz-Dürr: Naturally, we offer media training and use the new media for educational processes. I experience this very positively in academic research. When I work on a project with colleagues in other parts of the globe I can communicate with them through platforms, and the Internet is a wonderful medium for doing research. I am confronting this challenge, but I have to view the digital media from a critical perspective as well.

Mari Steindl: For me, there are two central questions. First of all: How do we use these things? That is a question of attitude. Are we fundamentally open enough to say “yes, I’d like to learn something”? And secondly: How can we manage this abundance of information properly?

Marlies Krainz-Dürr: That is also a central task of the schools. How can we turn these masses of data into information and how does that information become knowledge? What I think is dangerous, however, is the often anonymous form that such communication takes. Particularly in the field of education, this presents a tremendous problem, namely that of cyber-mobbing.

KKA: Here’s another catchword: audience development. A major transformation in communication with target groups is becoming apparent.

Christoph Thoma: I don’t have to reach everyone. As a business enterprise, one has to decide what, specifically, one wants to achieve. If I have a programme, I can define target groups. The opposite course of procedure, defining target groups and then developing a programme, is, in my opinion, the wrong way to go about it.

Mari Steindl: At IZ we have four different fields of activity with very diverse target groups. We therefore have to have a wide variety of programmes. In public relations work I learned the importance of target-oriented communication and target group work. You have to know what the target groups need and how to reach them.

Marlies Krainz-Dürr: We have a clearly defined target group and – if you will – a secure customer base. We try, of course, to come into closer contact with parents, and the situation there is very similar: There are all kinds of parents and children with very diverse backgrounds, and so we have to approach them in different ways. Education in the 21st century means dealing with diversity, differences and contradictions, and we have to gather experience so that we’ll be in a position to do so constructively and effectively.

KKA: How can one reach groups – for instance, declared target groups – with migration backgrounds today?

Christoph Thoma: It’s very simple: I try to talk to them. Here I’m thinking not so much of social networks but rather of conversations in person. Actively approaching people, creating programmes and then publicising them – this is very time-consuming work.

Mari Steindl: One problem is the discourse on integration and assimilation, which is often dominated by party politics. For me, the target group issue is directly related to dealing with cultural diversity. It involves questions of age, physical capabilities, sexual orientation and so on. It’s also a question of structures in institutions: Which people are employed there; what backgrounds and experience do they bring with them? It’s also a question of competences: Do our staff have the competence to deal constructively with diversity?

KKA: What I have been experiencing as an increasing challenge is the endeavour to communicate intensively about organisation-relevant decisions, especially as far as involving the staff in such decisions is concerned.

Marlies Krainz-Dürr: I have been rector for four years, and the most surprising thing for me was to discover that this job consists almost exclusively in communication. We spent a long time working out how to organise and improve our internal communication. We tried to build structures that allowed for more personal communication; for example, the first Wednesday of every month is a jour fixe at the rector’s office and anyone who wishes to can come.

Christoph Thoma: Despite e-mail, intranet and online connections, personal conversation is still the most important form of communication. I am an advocate of the new forms of communication, because they enable much faster decision making, but nevertheless, personnel management and participative decision-making processes still function best on the basis of personal discussion.

Mari Steindl: For us the challenge consists, on the one hand, in how we communicate internally, and on the other hand, in how we communicate with our partners. For example, I am very glad to have tools like Doodle² for scheduling appointments. But the challenge remains: How are we to deal with the huge amounts of diverse information and enquiries that we are confronted with every day? Personal talks cannot be replaced by other forms of communication.

KKA: Thank you all for the interesting discussion.

Marlies Krainz-Dürr has been rector of the University of Teacher Education in Carinthia since 2006. She studied teacher education (history and German language and literature) in Vienna and taught at various academic secondary schools. She is also an academically certified organisational consultant in the field of education. Marlies Krainz-Dürr works with the Interuniversitäres Institut für Forschung und Fortbildung (Interuniversity Institute for Research and Continuing Education) and is active in the field of teacher education and continuing education.
www.ph-kaernten.ac.at

The ethnologist Mari Steindl has been CEO (together with Gerhard Moßhammer) of the Interkulturelles Zentrum (Intercultural Centre) since May 2008. She acts as a project director and consultant for various national and international organisations and institutions (UNESCO, European Youth Forum, Council of Europe etc.) and is an expert on integration work and diversity management.
www.iz.or.at

Christoph Thoma has been Artistic Director and CEO of Grazer Spielstätten GmbH since 2008. He studied music (trumpet) and cultural management and served as Head of Music Education at Jeunesse Austria from 2002 to 2006, CEO of Bludenz Kultur from 2006 to 2008, and since 2011 he has been a member of the Steirisches Landeskulturbeirat (Styrian Provincial Advisory Committee on Culture) and Chairman of ASSITEJ Austria, the Austrian branch of the International Association of Theater for Children and Young People.
www.spielstaetten.at

¹Information and Communication Technology

² Doodle is a free Internet tool for scheduling meetings by means of polls, or simply for online opinion polls, that can be used anonymously and without registration.