8th of PR blogging :)

Chapter 8&10-Reputation Management: A driving force for action/ An issues-Crisis perspective

- After you read these chapters, you should be able to discuss the relevance of reputation management for organisations, understand the role of corporate public relations in contemporary organisations, explain the importance of stakeholders to the formation of corporate reputation, learn how public relations practitioners respond to and manage issues, understand the difference between a crisis and an issue, develop an understanding of the impact of new media on issues management and crisis public relations activities.

'Reputation' is defined in the Australian Concse Oxford Dictionary as, 'what is generally said about a person's or a thing's character...state of being well reported of, credit, distinction, respectability, good report.' I think, societal expectations of big business are greater than those of smaller organisations. Depending on the organisation, corporate public relations may primarily be the responsibility of inhouse mangers of external consultants or a combination of both.

In the US, Micho Spring, chairperson of Weber Shandwick's corporate practice, confirms that increased regulation has significantly changed the way comapnies communicate. "There are a lot more procedures to follownow," she says. " Information must be equally accessible to various stakeholders and media, and operations much be as transparent as possible. Communicationslogistics are under increasing scrutiny and this has altered the way companies deal with the media." According to her speech, the impat is also being felt in Europe.

In the traditional view of the firm, the stakeholder view, and the firm has a binding fiduciary duty to put teir needs first, to increase value for them. In older input-output models of the corporationism the firm converts the inputs of investors, employees, ad suppliers. The stakeholder view of strategy is an instrumental theory of the corporationm integrating both the resource-based view as well as the market-based view, and adding a socio-political level.

A company's reputation, or the essence of how it is viewed by all of its publics, is the leading factor in its ability success. with this in mind, the battered image of the corporate world is no small matter. Restoring trust and helping companies to earn a reputation for credibility will require sound public relations leadership. Indeed, with corporate integrity central on the minds of average Americans, the role of public reltions today is more critical than ever before.

What is issues management? I think it refers to the discipline and process of managing business issues and usually implies using technoogy to electronically automate the process. Indeed, on page 277 there is an example for difference between an issue and a crisis, pretty good to understand when you read it. Moreover, i think, the process of attuning to audience and stakeholder issues and concerns, and being sensitive to the growth of public opinion on an issue of relevance to the organisations, are key functions of the public relations practitioner. :)