One of the key activities for communicators in terms of reputation building is stakeholder engagement. Members tell us that they focus heavily on stakeholder engagement activities and are trying to be smarter about it – prioritizing key, influential stakeholders and keeping a pulse on what they are saying about the company. These activities involve not only monitoring for risks and potential issues, but also take the shape of more proactive engagement through thought leadership events, engaging and meeting with industry leaders, and promoting good corporate citizenship efforts.

Currently, most stakeholder engagement is focused around reputation risk management and justifying or positively reinforcing existing reputation activities. Some of the ways in which communicators manage reputation with stakeholders include:

• Stakeholder mapping and monitoring: this involves keeping a pulse on what stakeholders are saying about you, so that you may identify and preempt potential risks. Think of this one as good “housekeeping” to prevent issues or crises from rising. For example, Monsanto utilizes stakeholder-centric monitoring to prioritize issues for specific stakeholder groups. Other companies identify and prioritize reputation risks by mapping “degree of sensitivity to issue” against “strength of company position.”
• Stakeholder conversations and thought leadership: more proactively, communicators identify influencers and discuss issues of concern with them to establish the company as a thought leader in the industry. This is in addition to other thought leadership and executive communications programs. Chevron for example, holds thought leadership stakeholder discussions on important issues to the company.

These tactics are great if you, the Communications team, were the only ones engaging with stakeholders! But more and more it is your business partners and employees who have more frequent interactions with stakeholders.  Adding additional pressure is the fact that the external environment is becoming increasingly complex as stakeholders become more resourceful about how they access information and form perceptions about you.

The problem is that business partners and employees don’t necessarily know all the risks to reputation as they are having conversations with stakeholders, and won’t think through those interactions as strategically as communicators do. Read More »

I live at the epicenter of American politics just blocks east of the U.S. Capitol.  The Statue of Freedom that adorns the Capitol dome scrutinizes my morning commute.  As I scurry toward the Metro that will take me the enclave of the private sector for the day, she reminds me of the role and influence of government in our lives.

That influence is growing.  Don’t take my word for it or the collective voices of the masses that have coalesced in DC for various rallies and protests this past year.  Take instead the cold hard facts of the corporate communications budget.

In 2010 Communications’ government relations budgets increased by 7%, the largest shift in Communications budgets according to CEC’s annual Resource Allocation Benchmarking Survey.  CEC members can view the full survey on the website: 2010 Resource Allocation Benchmarks. Read More »

You don't have to camp outside of the Capitol to influence the government.

 The government’s influence on business is growing worldwide.  According to a recent McKinsey Global survey, 63% of executives believe the government’s impact on their industry will increase in the next 3-5 years.  It’s no surprise then that we here at CEC have been bombarded with questions about how to set up a more potent and persuasive government relations function within Comms.  Communicators are seeking to influence government and thus, more fully exert their freedom and license to operate. 

However…what if, instead of thinking about how to directly influence the government, we thought about influencing  those that hold disproportionate influence over the government — the public. 

Read More »

Public Affairs, You Confuse Me.

Calling all communicators in the business of Public Affairs—what makes you stand out from the rest of your peers in Communications?

• Do you have key legislators and lobbyists on your BBM contacts?
• Are you the sole owner of CSR and community relations initiatives?
• Are you the policy guru, spotting nefarious legislation and getting your company ahead the messaging curve?
• Do you spend countless hours grooming your CEO and other executives for government testimony?

Read no further if you have an answer and wouldn’t mind sharing it with me. Continue on if you think I’m a confused Millennial. Read More »

Chances are good that a lot of bad things are being said about your company right this second on the web. Don’t believe me? Search for your company on Twitter. Fair warning—it may be ugly. Angry rants are one thing, but what about when people spread reputation-crushing lies and misinformation about your company? How can you share your company’s side of the story in an authentic way? Here’s a hint: traditional tactics and campaigns will do little to counteract viral venom spewed at your company on the web.

One antidote that companies embroiled in controversy are turning to is issues-focused blogs. These blogs are designed to shed light on the company’s position and shape public conversation on key issues. To get the CEC Insider scoop on how to create and manage an issues-focused blog, I turned to one of the leaders in this space, Justin Higgs. Justin is the New Media Advisor at Chevron and primary editor of its blog The Amazon Post, a forum for communicating through an ongoing multi-billion-dollar lawsuit against the energy company in Ecuador. Read More »

Before the namesake of ObamaCare was in the U.S. Senate, I completed an undergraduate certificate program in Health Policy, primarily to stay on the family payroll for an extra semester.  Last week, those extra credits foolishly prompted me to volunteer this entry on what communicators should know and do about the reform bill.  Fortunately, our sister program serving benefits executives has produced a tidy 6-page summary of key provisions, but it may be more fortunate that they have us, as their recent online survey revealed communications about the bill as their most immediate concern.

Here are the most important things for corporate communicators to know right now about the health care reform bill:

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