Reputation Management and An Issues-Crisis Perspective

Reputation of an organization has a close relationship with its survival. A company cannot be run with a bad public image. Therefore, public relations has to deal with reputation management. Which is the most important consideration in public relations – reputation or relationships? I think both are equally important and support each other. An organization cannot have a good reputation while its relationships with its publics are declining; and vice versa.

The challenge of corporate public relations

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is defined as "the economic, legal, ethical, and discretionary expectations that society has of organizations at a given point in time". Corporate public relations is so challenging in part because the community seems to have contradictory expectations of big business. I guess the role of a PR practitioner is to show CSR of his/her organization to the public as a practice of reputation management.

How is reputation created?

It is said that reputation is the results of consistently delivering on promises. The task of public relations is to make sure the organization gets credit for the good things it does. Potentially, everyone in an organization can contribute to overall reputation, whether positively or otherwise.

However, I am wondering how an employee can contribute to building reputation for his company? Is it possible? I think what he can do is:

- putting efforts into his work to increase productivity and work quality

-performing professionally when dealing with customers

I wonder whether I am right...^^

The role of corporate public relations

The key role of corporate public relations at a strategic level is as a facilitator and adviser, that, :

- helps to ensure that stakeholder needs are understood and met

- encourages consistency in delivering on promises

- coaches employees at all levels in communicating effectively with stakeholders

- helps to articulate and frame messages that it may well fall to others to deliver.

MAJOR CONCEPTS IN CORPORATE RELATIONS

Corporate reputation

Corporate reputation can be defined as "a collective assessment of a company's ability to provide valued outcomes to a representative group of stakeholders"

Stewart Lewis listed six facets of overall reputation: social responsibility, environment responsibility, leadership, quality of products or services, financial performance and treatment of staff.

However, how do people measure an organization's reputation? In which method?

Corporate image

Image is said to refer to perceptions held about an organization at a given point in time, whereas corporate reputation itself is supposedly established over the longer term.

Grunig suggested two different meanings of the word "image": production and consumption of images.

The danger of the term "image" for public relations is that it may be viewed superficially. Practitioners may fall into the trap thinking good relations with stakeholders can be built on the basis of slick and cynical manipulation of corporate image. This is mistaken from an ethical as well as a practical perspective.

Corporate brand and identity

There is a considerable overlap between an organization's identity and its corporate brand although there are important differences.

Corporate identity can be defined as the tangible manifestation a corporate personality. It is the identity that projects and reflects the reality of the corporate personality.

Corporate brand refers to the company behind the products and services, not only the products brand itself.

A product brand represents the promise of a bundle of attributes that someone buys and that provides satisfaction.

The links between issues, crises, and public relations management

Crises are unpredictable events that can impact an organization's viability, credibility and reputation. An organization's reaction to the crisis, in terms of timing, stakeholder communication and corporate behaviour, will leave an indelible impression on its publics. The reaction of key publics during the crisis will determine if the company survives and is able to recover. Therefore, I guess public relations practitioners should be very careful when dealing with the publics, especially when external environment is changing rapidly.

Public relations practitioners should consider the media's portrayal of events as they will play a vital role in the organization's attempt to communicate with their key publics.

What is issues management?

Issues management is a specific management function that seeks to identify potential, emerging or actual trends, concerns or issues likely to affect an organization and its key publics. Once the issue is identified, the organization will develop a coordinated response to best manage and influence its progression.

EXAMPLE of ISSUE MANAGEMENT

In mid-2006 a significant fraud issue was surfacing in Queensland with the Queensland Police Service estimating AU$300,000 per month was being swindled from innocent victims and sent off shore to fraudsters in Nigeria.

Fraudsters often encourage their innocent victims to use services like Western Union, a money transfer service offering fast and reliable money wiring, to transfer funds overseas.

Following Western Union’s successful consumer fraud prevention campaign with the Metropolitan Police in the UK, Western Union and the Queensland Police Service formed a partnership to trial a similar program to empower Queensland consumers with the knowledge of how to prevent fraud affecting them. The services of PPR were engaged on behalf of Western Union (Asia Pacific) to assist in the strategic planning and drive the trial in Queensland.

As Western Union’s business model is based on agents managing locations, with no offices in Queensland, PPR determined a media campaign, with the support of the Queensland Police Service, would be key to reaching the target audience. The strong talent consisting of scam victims and reputable police spokespeople underpinned the success of the campaign.

Within one week of implementation, and as a result of the increased calls from the public, the Queensland Police Service prevented 15 incidents of consumer fraud.

A PR campaign was organized to:

• Make consumer fraud topical to capture the attention of the general public and show it can “happen to anyone”
• Empower consumers with fraud prevention tips (already prepared by Western Union) which show the seriousness of the situation
• Encourage consumers to report potential fraud incidents to the Queensland Police Service

PPR provided strategic advice, based on local market knowledge, to determine the best state-wide media campaign focused on providing consumers with the motivation and information needed to protect themselves against consumer fraud.

1. The strategy behind the media campaign plan included:Highlighting Western Union’s credibility by promoting its partnership with the Queensland Police Service to emphasise consumer fraud is a community issue, not a commercial one for Western Union
2. Removing the stigma attached to victims by using local victims of fraud to highlight anyone can get scammed
3. Educating consumers on how they can prevent themselves from becoming a victim, thus reducing the incidence of consumer fraud, and protecting customers’ positive experience using Western Union,
4. Demonstrating Western Union’s position as a good corporate citizen by highlighting its serious stance on consumer fraud
5. Creating a high profile press conference which would make the issue topical and generate coverage highlighting the seriousness of the situation.