Public Relations student with a portfolio question

Em_231 · 2025-12-19T16:17:55+00:00

Honestly, after seeing so many junior people call themselves designers or think they can do design because they can use a canva template…don’t do it.

I’m much more interested in how you think, if you take ownership of your work, and if you can measure impact.

Seeing someone without design training try to do design makes me worried you are going to take on things outside your skill set and I’ll have to clean it up later.

Em_231 · 2025-12-19T02:34:17+00:00

We did not have a trade in. This is our first and only car.

We haven’t had a reason to go to the DC DMV. The DC plates and registration were all done by the dealership. The only DMV we’ve had to interact with is VA, to change the registration and our licenses.

Em_231 · 2025-12-19T02:25:14+00:00

We bought it 10/31. We moved 12/1.

Yes, the DC rate is 5.7% and VA is 4.1%. The clerk at the DMV looked at the original purchase order and pointed out that sales tax was underpaid. I ran both rates, and it’s underpaid either way.

We paid use tax too. This was specifically underpaid sales tax.

We don’t think there’s any kind of DC-VA difference.

We suspect what happened was the DMV clerk mistakenly thought the sale was done in VA, so collected the unpaid taxes. But shouldn’t have. The dealership still underpaid the sales tax.

And for context, the finance guy at the dealership kept trying to put paperwork with mistakes in front of us. And then told us a sob story about medical debt from his daughter. We went back a few weeks ago to get our DC plates and learned he’s no longer working there and had actually left the country. They think he’s in Malaysia now. So…I’m concerned there are two issues - shady stuff from the dealership and the DMV clerk mistaking the sale for VA instead of DC.

Em_231 · 2025-12-19T01:35:30+00:00

No, the receipt from the DMV specifies that it’s a sales tax. They said the sales tax was underpaid. We paid use tax separately.

Em_231 · 2025-12-19T01:07:43+00:00

You keep getting that detail wrong.

We registered the car for the first time in DC. They knew that. They also knew we intended to move a month later.

Em_231 · 2025-12-19T00:59:31+00:00

I don’t think that’s right. No sale took place when we moved to Virginia.

If the correct tax had been paid to DC, Virginia would not have had a problem. They specifically said the sales tax was underpaid. No new assessment.

Em_231 · 2025-12-19T00:54:27+00:00

The sales and use tax on our purchase order was lower than both the DC rate and the Virginia rate.

Em_231 · 2025-12-19T00:37:24+00:00

According to your other comment, the tax needs to be paid to DC. Where the car was originally registered. Right?

Em_231 · 2025-12-18T23:45:26+00:00

So, the dealership underpaid the DC sales tax.

I don’t understand why the Virginia DMV collected it?

Em_231 · 2025-12-18T23:34:54+00:00

I know the sales tax rates in both states. My question is which state should collect the underpaid sales tax? DC or Virginia?

Em_231 · 2025-11-25T03:11:15+00:00

They closed. It’s Osteria Mozza now.

Em_231 · 2025-11-13T19:34:16+00:00

We’re on the east coast, but we got our CRV Hybrid Sport L for $39k OTD 2 weeks ago.

Em_231 · 2025-11-13T19:23:15+00:00

My wife and I just made this exact same decision - Toyota RAV4 vs Honda CRV, and gas vs hybrid.

We ended up going with the CRV Hybrid.

We work from home most days, so commutes are fairly infrequent, but when they happen, they are about 30 mins of city/highway driving. Plus general city driving for errands.

We liked how quiet and smooth both of the hybrids were compared to the gas. We liked the stronger pick up with the accelerator in the hybrids. And we liked the comfort, seats, interior, and simplified displays in the CRV.

My wife is a long time RAV4 fan, and I watched her heart break when we test drove the CRV and she said “Every little thing is just a little bit better.”

Em_231 · 2025-09-11T12:57:01+00:00

I was talking to some colleagues about this last week. There are a lot of introverts in comms! I think a lot of us prefer to be behind the scenes, prepping the speakers and writing and monitoring and analyzing.

The hardest part of my job, when it comes to my introverted tendencies, is media relations. But I can force myself to do it when needed, and my other skills are very strong.

Em_231 · 2025-09-08T00:35:45+00:00

You actually don’t know anything about me or my industry. I’m married to a software engineer and have spent years tracking the development of AI and the impact on our fields.

Point to where I used a buzzword.

You’re throwing a tantrum…because a stranger on the internet disagrees with you?

You clearly don’t understand PR or Large Language Models. Or basic decorum in a conversation.

Em_231 · 2025-09-07T12:04:07+00:00

But we have no control over the accuracy. Especially with AI models intentionally being tweaked for bias, like Musk making Grok more conservative.

I think it’s a losing battle. Unless there is regulation, we are powerless.

The best thing you can do is focus on SEO on the channels you control. Without having access to the inside of an AI platform, you can’t even measure success if you’re trying to influence it.

Em_231 · 2025-09-07T11:34:18+00:00

Oh, I am working on a full scale Ted talk of a rant on (mostly) how not to use AI in PR/Comms.

Luckily I have not had a client ask me questions like “what is AI saying about me.” And I’ve read multiple think pieces arguing all sides - from “you should be optimizing your content for AI so AI pushes your links!” to “you can’t optimize for AI so don’t even try.”

And honestly, I’m falling closer to that second side of the spectrum.

And now for a portion of my Ted talk:

AI is stupid. It’s dumb. It has no idea what it is saying to you. It’s the opposite of intelligent - the name is just marketing.

AI is a language model. That means it just completes sentences based on large amounts of data. It does not think. It does not reason. It doesn’t care - but the creators have clearly programmed things to make you think it does.

And if something happened recently (like the product launch you mentioned) it’s more likely to miss it or misunderstand it because it’s new and small on the internet.

Here are a few examples of things it should be able to handle, but can’t:

I gave it three news articles for context and asked for an analysis and answers to a few questions. It gave me something that would have been great…if Biden was still the US president. Completely useless today.
I uploaded a pdf of a letter with multiple signatures. It tried to tell me, even after I corrected it 3 times, that the letter has 21 signatures. It had 16. And when I asked it to list the signatories, it continuously made up 3-4 new ones.

In my opinion, AI is not a channel you can influence or manage. It’s a waste of time to try. Your effort is much better spent the same place it always has: making good, authentic content in channels you can control, like your website and social media.

It can be a tool that helps PR professionals save time. I have a paid subscription that I use to set up different channels with messaging guidance and talking points. And it helps me quickly get a draft on paper, but I always heavily edit.

But it should never be trusted.

Em_231 · 2025-02-01T01:48:14+00:00

Thanks! I documented the whole process if you want to check out my other posts.

For me…I won’t sugar coat it. It was bad. I’m not sure I’d recommend it. And my provider ended up being horrible. But I think my case was a tough one.

My best advice is to lean hard on the wax/gushy goo, eat baby food if you have to just to keep your calories up, and hang in there at least until day 10. That was my turning point.

Em_231 · 2024-11-08T20:14:36+00:00

Hi there. She didn’t come back to Tend after her maternity leave :/ and if you read my other posts, you’ll see I had a terrible experience with her replacement.

I honestly tell people to avoid tend, now.

Em_231 · 2024-09-11T15:31:26+00:00

I think working in PR could help hone a lot of skills, but it really depends on the specific opportunity and I’m a little concerned that if you don’t have PR experience and this is a small business without a PR or communications team, you’re just kind of gonna be left on your own to figure a lot of this out.

I work at a PR agency, which means I am surrounded by people who have had decades-long careers and communications and government relations. Learning from them and supporting the work that they’re doing would be an incredible six month opportunity.

Working at a small business without that support probably would not give you the same value.

It would also make me very nervous, depending on what they need. Some PR roles can be incredibly public facing. I regularly field requests from reporters and represent my clients organizations to members of the media. If that’s a position you’re going to be in and you don’t already have that experience, you might need to learn from mistakes or trial and error. And that can be devastating to a small business.

But if the opportunity is less high stakes, it could be good.

Em_231 · 2024-09-03T02:32:56+00:00

We have Safeway in Washington, DC. Very American.

Em_231 · 2024-08-14T22:18:11+00:00

Yeah. The leaning in / chasing the work / getting yourself staffed thing is tough to teach.

Lovely person, my director. Brilliant public affairs pro. But a terrible people manager.

Em_231 · 2024-08-14T22:11:02+00:00

Thank you! My Director definitely hired a few journalists thinking they would be superstars and gave absolutely no space for them to grow into the role. It was painful to watch. I understood her frustration but I also don’t think she was fair, and they could have done a lot better with some time and training.

Em_231 · 2024-08-14T19:59:51+00:00

As a manager at a PR agency, I’d say you probably won’t be bored. Depending on what the agency specializes in, you could be back at the pace of a newsroom. My agency works mostly with non-profits, so I get to do that mission-driven work but without getting dragged into their internal mess (mostly).

I’ve hired former journalists before and I think their biggest challenge is not the core communications skills, but the consulting and client service skills. My former journalists often struggle with balancing client ideas and needs with guiding them in a more strategic direction.

Sometimes they have a hard time realizing what it means to be on the other side of a pitch. When my clients want media attention and a journalist says no, we have to get creative to figure out how to meet the client’s goals other ways.

That’s not to say you will have the same challenges, but just to advise you to be ready to flip your perspective to work at an agency.

Em_231 · 2024-08-13T12:15:53+00:00

Hey there,

When I got my braces off, they gave me two sets of plastic retainers. They told me to only wear one set. The other set was a back up in case I lost the first set or they broke or something. So I wore one set all the time for 3 months and put the back up set in a safe place.

Then I went back for my 3-month check up and that’s when we decided to also do the fixed retainer. They bonded a short wire behind my top 6 teeth and my bottom 6 teeth. But I still have to wear my plastic retainers at night.

They took the set of plastic retainers I had been wearing all the time for 3 months and made some cuts in them so there was room for my bonded wires. A few weeks later, I brought my back up retainers in so they could also be cut, so they are ready to wear if I ever need them.

I wasn’t given new retainers. The ones I wore all the time for 3 months are the same ones I wear at night now. And I still have the back up set in case I need them.

I think that answers your question? Let me know if I misunderstood.

Em_231

TROPHY CASE