We introduce our first guest blogger of our new monthly series on the 25th of every month, in celebration of our 25th anniversary.

David Houle, author of The Shift Age is one of the top futurists in the country and a much-sought after speaker.  Houle spent more than 20 years in media and entertainment having worked at NBC, CBS and a member of the senior executive team that created and launched MTV, Nickelodeon, VH1 and CNN Headline News.

This new decade, 2010-2020, will be known as the Transformation Decade. The definitions of transformation are several: the act or process of transforming, the state of being transformed, change in form, appearance, nature, or character.

Don’t those definitions feel like what has been already going on in your life and the world? Many of us have already been living in this state. Many of us have only recently felt the impending alterations, disruptions and reorganizations that have begun. Everything seems to be in a transforming state of shift.

We are entering the first full decade of the Shift Age, even though it has already taken root in the last 4 years. This new age has launched incredible shift and upheaval already. This current Great Recession can only be fully understood when seen as the reorganizational recession between two ages, the Information Age and the Shift Age. It is not unlike the recessions of the 1970s, which was the decade of transition between the Industrial and Information Ages. Almost everything is in a state of shift, in a state of being transformed.

To those that may think we are still in the Information Age let me ask you a question I often ask audiences: raise your hand if you don’t have enough information in your life? Of course no one raises their hand. Value, to some degree, is base upon scarcity. If there is too much information, it no longer has value. What will have value in the Shift Age and this new Transformation Decade is attention. The information you put your attention on is what becomes valuable. The question PR professionals must dynamically answer is how can you create attention that therefore creates value?

Think about all that is going on in your life and in the world. The way we communicate has and will continue to change in form, appearance (our gadgets are vastly different that even five years ago) and character (how many of you text or tweet regularly versus even three years ago). The shape of our relationships is changing. The shape of how we work, how we live and how and in what we travel are all changing. The economy and the workplace are changing and being reshaped.

In the next ten years there will be a level of transformation probably unmatched in human history. Just take a look at some disruptions that will transform the PR business:

• Humanity’s relationship to communication technology is rapidly changing and will bring on-going transformation socially, culturally and economically.
• Media will be completely different than it is today. We are only at the initial creative destruction phase of it now
• The workplace will be transformed as the place part becomes less and less relevant. Human beings will only need to be in the same place to collaborate, as work is increasingly defined as collaborative.
• The Internet and our rapid fire use of mobile digital devices to access it has created a pulsing, synaptic place of unprecedented interactivity that on a global scale is starting to feel like a global brain. It is a live, morphing place called the Neurosphere that is not only transforming us now, but could well be the technological model for a new level of human consciousness in 10-20 years. That is an evolutionary level of transformation. An evolution shift of transformative effect.. It may be hard for you to envision, but we are rapidly moving in that direction.

The list could go on and on as to what will be transformed. Take a snapshot look at your life now with all your relationships, ways of thinking, ways of living and ways of looking at the world I promise you that when you take the same snapshot in ten years you will astounded as to the transformation that will have occurred. The speed of change is now both constantly accelerating and environmental. It may feel uncomfortable as familiar things and ways of living are disintegrating. Transformation, to varying degrees, is always uncomfortable. We are and will be transformed in the next ten years.

We have entered the Transformation Decade.

Agency Marks Milestone Year Of Servicing Local, National And International Clients

LOS ANGELES (January 21, 2010) – The Pollack PR Marketing Group (PPMG), an integrated PR and marketing agency announced today that it is kicking off its celebratory anniversary year as it turns 25 on the 25th of March. Founded in 1985 as Pollack & Setzer by senior strategists Noemi Pollack and Paul Setzer, the firm evolved into a multi-specialty agency that develops communication platforms and programs, manages corporate reputations, launches new products and services, and promotes consumer brand engagement for clients ranging from innovative start-ups to Fortune 500 companies, with a focus on consumer products, technologies and services.

“When we think of ourselves as a quarter of a century old, the longevity in that phrase really astonishes,” said Founder & Chief Executive Officer Noemi Pollack. “Just consider that the day the agency opened its doors, there were computers, but no internet, no email, no cell phones; it was the analog age and would move to the digital age only a decade later; it would be another decade before social media would enter our consciousness: and then, at a very quickened pace, the whole communication landscape changed with the advent of digital marketing and, of course, Twitter.”

Fourteen years after its founding, the agency became a partner in The WORLDCOM Public Relations Group, a consortium of 110 agencies in 94 world markets, which added the collective resources and talents of 2,200 professionals that creatively and collaboratively handle small to large scale local, national and international public relations and marketing campaigns, seamlessly.

Jerry Swerling, public relations management consultant, commented, “I’ve been in PR for almost 40 years, 20 of them here in LA. In that time an astonishing number of agencies have disappeared from the scene, because they either couldn’t figure out who they were and what they did, or lost the entrepreneurial spirit and sold to a conglomerate, or simply lacked talent. The fact that the Pollack PR Marketing Group has thrived for 25 years, as a staunchly independent firm in the highly competitive LA market, is an enormous testimonial to the firm’s leadership, sense of self, and commitment to long term client relationships.”

The year-long celebration will include: publishing the 25 most defining PR moments in the last 25 years that brought about the most seismic changes to the communications industry; developing and posting videos on the 25th of every month of forward-thinking communication concepts and ideas that incorporate evolving communication trends, as well as concepts that can support smoother adoption of ‘change’ by corporations – globally; and a community relations “roll-up-your-sleeves” plan, whereby each agency professional will get an opportunity to work an 8-hour day at a charity of their choice on the 25th of every month and, in return, the agency will offer a donation to each charity.

Additionally, guest bloggers who wish to offer their thoughts on whatever is on their minds will be invited to do so on the 25th of every month; and suggestions as to pivotal PR moments for inclusion in the list of 25, will also be requested.

The first guest blogger, futurist David Houle and author of the “Shift Age,” will kick off the guest series with an entry on the 25th of January.

ABOUT THE POLLACK PR MARKETING GROUP
The Pollack PR Marketing Group (PPMG) based in Century City, CA, is a 25-year old mid-sized, multi-specialty agency that develops communication platforms and programs, manages corporate reputations, launches new products and services and promotes consumer brand engagement for clients ranging from innovative start-ups, to Fortune 500 companies, with a focus on consumer products, technologies and services. PPMG is a partner in The WORLDCOM Public Relations Group, a consortium of over 100 partners with offices around the world. For more information, visit http://www.ppmgcorp.com, or http://www.pollackblog.com, or follow us on Twitter @PollackPRMktg.