Why should journalists contact top managements directly?

I am part of the PR Point and Image Management, online PR community. Recently one of the members raised an issue on why journalists contact top management of companies directly.

Here are my views which I had posted in the group.

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Nice topic and often deliberated within the PR industry. Lately, I have seen many clients also discussing the same with the agencies.

I believe that this is just basic human psychology. Journalist have been traditionally close to the top management as there was no active PR function in the past. Having closely interacted with them it would be very difficult for the journalist community to see a young graduate interfering and explaining them new rules of the game. Of course, it is also true that PR is today not (in most cases) capable of adding value.

Let me take an example: A company announces its results, how many of us in the PR community would be able to read a balance sheet and talk authoritatively about client's performance. Another one, let us say an auto journalist wants to know why the braking system of a particular companies model is not as per standards, will I be able to answer it.

Well, having said that PR is maturing and this scenario will change.

In today's competitive business environment, I am not sure how long the CEOs in future will find time to respond to the journalists directly and on-time.

In the meantime, till the PR community is able to think for its clients, journalists will continue to contact CEOs directly.