(Maribor, Slovenia, April 26th, 2006.) 

Each year before the International Conference on Communication Practice, SPEM Communication Group conducts a research related to the main topic of the conference. This year, participants of the conference organised by the Slovene PR Agencies Association (ZOJS) and the London School of Public Relations (LSPR) will get fully acquainted with the particularly important business objectives-centred communication. As a response, a research on communication between directors and journalists in Slovenia and Croatia has been undertaken.

About half of Slovenian and Croatian directors deem journalists have been duly summarising reports communicated by companies. On the contrary, a large majority of Slovenian and Croatian economics journalists believe that firms have not been communicating well, or have only been communicating well occasionally, according to the research that SPEM conducted among journalists and directors in Slovenia and Croatia. Journalists in both countries agree that firms do not provide them with up-to-date information all the time. As to obtain relevant information, journalists often have to act on their own initiative. They also state that the most frequent grounds for the companies’ refusal to provide information are business secret concerns, unrelatedness with company’s operations, and lack of firms’ interest in allowing a specific topic to become known. 22,6 percent of Slovenian journalists and 26,9 percent of their Croatian counterparts deem they cannot get information because companies do not want to communicate with them and their media. At the same time, only 4,2 percent of Slovenian directors and as many as 20,6 percent of Croatian directors agree with the above.

150 Slovenian and the same number of Croatian directors of companies with over 100 employees as well as 40 economics journalists from Slovenia and 40 from Croatia participated in the research conducted by SPEM Communication Group between 10th and 13th April 2006.

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Additional information:
Urška Ribič; Phone. +386 (0)2 228 44 61 and
Majna Šilih; Phone.  +386 (0)2 228 44 39
E-mail: info@portoroz-conference.com  
The conference web portal: www.portoroz-conference.com