The phrase 'public relations' (PR) is often misunderstood in the business world, and the inaccuracy can be traced back to the evolution of PR. It is argued that companies may prefer to have their PR executives function in roles that are decades out of date, namely, as press agents (phase I) or as publicity agents (phase II) rather than as PR counselors (phase III). The result is that problems that could be solved when they are small grow into crises unnecessarily. The effective phase III PR counselor functions as an 'early-warning system' by following a five-step process to improve the flow of communication between an organization and its many publics.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">&gt;</ETX>