Dr. Pete Smudde

Research Interests & Areas

I am most interested in several areas of study in public relations, all based on his unique combination of industry and academic experiences. First, I study public relations as an essential part of corporate strategy, including performance management. Second, I examine corporate message design, especially in cases of managing corporate reputations. Third, I am interested in internal public relations (a.k.a. "employee relations" or "internal communication"), especially leadership and management matters that link to internal PR. Fourth, I explore pedagogical approaches to public relations that meet academic and industry demands. Finally, I also investigate spirituality in the workplace, and I target selected topics that can involve PR as evangelization. Specific orientations for my work have included, for example, Kenneth Burke, Michel Foucault, Karl Weick, and perspectives and principles from the fields of linguistics, semiotics, composition studies, and business management. I favor the methodologies of rhetorical criticism, ethnography, and discourse analysis, and I am comfortable working with other approaches that are qualitative or quantitative.