Abstract

The level and rate of growth in public relations practice in Nigeria though encouraging, the developmental striveis slow. The later accounts for the retarded growth rate of professionalism status attainment in the practice ofpublic relations in Nigeria. This work therefore considered the role and relevance of standards in the practice ofpublic relations, built on ethics and ethical values; as basic requirements for professionalism. It appraised thepractice of public relations vis-à-vis other practices such as law and medicine and x-rayed the constraints toprofessionalism in public relations. The impact of public relations practitioners’ characters/traits, work habitsand membership enlistments requirements were assessed as factors that influence the quality of members’(service) output. Equally evaluated are the influences of non-universality and inconsistency characteristics ofethics and non-culpability of ethical breach on the practice of public relations. The work in addition, consideredthe role of confidentiality, integrity and objectivity in public relations practice and assessed the NIPRdisciplinary management procedure given the institute’s code of practice. Adequate analytical and statisticaltools including Likert ranking scale and the ordinal and interval ranking scales, were employed in internal andexternal factor influence appraisals and solutions among others. In the midst of constraints were recommendedas strive strategies to the attainment of professionalism in the practice of public relations in Nigeria. Inclusive ofthese are unified method of fees determination for practitioners, pre and post accreditation of membership,review of codes of practice for universality, improvement in the method and procedure of dispute managementamong others.

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