The few, the proud, the satisfied? The relationship between perceptions of public affairs and job satisfaction in the U.S. Marine Corps

•Online survey measured agreement in PR role in an organization between practitioner and C-Suite.•Examined impact of role congruency between C-Suite and PR practitioner on that PR professional’s job satisfaction.•Study used U.S. Marine Corps PR professionals and C-Suite leadership, representing a global organization with uniform job descriptions. An online survey (N = 220) empirically tested the coorientation of public affairs role expectations between U.S. Marine Corps public affairs practitioners and non-public affairs supervisors in the U.S. Marine Corps. The researchers applied organizational role theory and used a job satisfaction scale to observe the possible relationship between role ambiguity, role conflict, and job satisfaction. Results indicate that role clarity exists for these professionals, and positively correlates to increased job satisfaction among public affairs practitioners.