ABSTRACT
Corporate reputation is based not just on what companies say, but also what
they do
Corporate reputation is a long-term viewpoint held by various publics about
the perceived behavior of a firm
A single individual can make a major difference in terms of personal and
institutional reputation
Reputation can be enhanced by effective public communication
Positive employee, media, and government relations are dependent on fiscal
realities
A business, whether it be local or global, has a personality or image that gels into its reputation. Many researchers have pointed out that reputation is a major factor in achieving organizational goals and competitively differentiating one corporation from another (see, for example, Stuart 1999; Melewar and Saunders 2000; Schultz and Kitchen 2004). There is general agreement that a “corporate brand” as well as specific product brand names have value (“brand equity”). But individual perceptions of an organization may differ depending on the conditions, and these many images can complicate our understanding of what a corporation’s reputation is.
