With turmoil in financial markets, reverberations continue to spread throughout the economy. Volatility continues, its impact felt across industries around the world. As fortunes shift, companies need to communicate new priorities to stakeholders. Even for companies not directly affected, stakeholders will want to know what the current situation means and how their company will be affected in the long term.

I'm going out on a ledge here, and writing this column two weeks before Election Day. There's a decent chance you're reading this after we know the identity of our next president. So if Sen. John McCain won the election, what follows won't hold much water. But, if Sen. Barack Obama is our next president, I think there are some lessons we should all consider.

The announcement that insurance company AIG hired Burson-Marsteller for PR work brought out the critics, including the New York Post, which said the company was "wasting money on a high-priced public relations firm."

In Detroit last week, I met with a number of PR pros at the PRSA International Conference. The crowd, estimated at just under 3,000, included educators, CEOs, top-level agency and corporate PR pros, and students who attended a PRSSA session concurrently.

Ray Jordan, corporate VP of public affairs and corporate communications at Johnson & Johnson, urged his audience last week to "go forth and reputate."

I've given up trying to determine when the new business "phone" will be the busiest. But in my experience, things usually heat up in the 4th quarter - even this year, despite the economy.

For those of us who practice crisis communications or advise others on the subject, the recent financial institution meltdown provided a particularly apt case study. It proved once again that, in a crisis, strategy, actions, and words all matter.

As a journalist covering the PR industry, I'm astounded at the number of cause marketing programs currently in the marketplace. Every week, it seems, PRWeek covers a new campaign related to a worthy cause - from cancer research and ending poverty to the environment and education.

Last week, PRWeek reported that some clients have cut ties with their agency partners or put PR on hiatus until the economy stabilizes. When times are tough, companies are within reason to scale back on budgets.

PR has really been taking it on the chin in the blogosphere over the past couple of weeks. Some of the charges include PR being too controlling and even unnecessary if a company has something interesting and wants to launch it.