ISL451U-BUSINESS COMMUNICATION
Chapter 5: Strategic Communication
Corporate Communication as a Strategic Communication Tool
“Corporate communication refers to all communication works that a corporation engages in to be more efficient and productive” (1994: 1). Corporate Communication is divided into three categories:
• Management communication: Communication of managers at different ranks with internal and external target groups. • Marketing communication: Marketing communication focuses on advertisements, personal sales, sponsorship and direct mailing. • Organizational communication: Within the context of organizational communication, there is public relations, investor relations, corporate advertisements, internal communication and employee communication.
Corporate communication has four objectives:
• Corporate communication aims to reach all people both inside and outside of the corporation. • Corporate communication is a long-term process. • Corporate communication makes the facts apparent and aims to display messages without exaggerating. • Other corporations, pressures and directives of the public and media have a forcing effect in actualizing corporate communication.
In addition to mutual interactions between corporate communication functions, each of which demands expertise, they also play a vital role in reaching all communication works to corporate objectives and to form a unity among functions. In the research of Hutton, Goodman and Genest, Argenti’s work was studied in more detail in relation to the order of these functions, and the roles of the functions of corporate communication are categorized as below in 8 main headings (Hutton et al., 2001: 255):
• Reputation management • Image Management • Supporting Corporate Policies • Providing Information to Stakeholders • Publicity • Managing the Relations with Noncustomer Stakeholders • Managing the Relations with all Stakeholders • Supporting Marketing and Sales
Lobbying as a Strategic Communication Tool
Lobbying is a wide-scope political activity domain that utilizes lobby activities which integrate organized, continuous and creative actions that are executed by hired professional lobbyists, representatives of pressure groups, state agencies, public relations implementers, lawyers, retired bureaucrats etc. in relation to public opinion, pressure groups, companies or lobbies, in line with both
their interests within the country and general interests of their countries, in national or international dimension, towards executive, legislative and judicial powers to the end of adopting and without diverting from ethical framework supporting the laws to realize aspired desires or opposing and even changing the laws that conflict with interests (Ker Dincer, 2019: 9).
Lobbying also integrates the mutual relations across an organization and government, parliament, officials and both national and international special interest and pressure groups. In that case lobbies conduct activities to orient and influence political mechanism in line with their self-interests.
In strategic communication, characteristics of stakeholders and target mass are quite important. All of the possessed means and tools must be utilized by considering target mass. Although lobbying activities have many principles, there are ten leading tenets. An explanation of these principles would also clarify the way lobbying activities should be implemented.
• Mastery in subject matter • Being flexible and creative • Providing accurate and consistent data • Being simple and comprehensible • Making friends • Knowing your competitors • Being realistic • Building cooperation • Taking the local into consideration • Acknowledging:
Within the scope of grassroots activities, lobbying activities can be analyzed below two headings as letter diplomacy and organizations on public relations campaigns:
• While trying to influence public opinion to serve their interests, they can provide significant data to the regulations that would benefit them. • They could offer opportunities to ensure that activities take place in the media.
There are two factors to consider in the effective implementation of public relations activities in lobbying initiatives: (a) Effective use of public opinion molding and public relations practicing methods of the lobbyists. (b) Selecting effective tools
To meet lobbying activities with success, below mentioned factors play a major role and some of them are:
• “Accessing those who hold the decision making power, • Investigating the past, • Correct timing, • Communication skills, • Awareness on political procedure, • Public interest,
• Gaining the support of the lead names in society (opinion leaders), • Setting the target in an efficient manner, • Sharing positive news on lobbying activities in the media, • Recognizing and understanding the state structure” (Theaker, 2006, p.170).
Crisis Communication and Management as a Strategic Communication Activity
In its simplest definition crisis is a serious condition of unbalance that damages normal activities of an organization or corporation. This is the kind of process threatening short and long term objectives of a corporation, requiring immediate reactions but also limiting decision making duration for response and most importantly confusing decision-making units by its existence and pushing them towards indecision.
Before anything else, a crisis is a stressful situation. Crisis is a threat and requires immediate response. For some, it is an unexpected situation but for others despite sending early signals it is a situation that is misinterpreted and realized late due to specific reasons. Crisis Management Institute in the USA (ICM) groups crises under 4 categories (Kasapoğlu, 2008):
1. Natural Disasters 2. Mechanical Problems 3. Human Errors 4. Managerial Decisions or Indecisions
Crisis managers should be trained to be informed against crisis and corporate weaknesses that pave the way for deterioration, reflexes and to prevent high-cost incomplete preparations and pathological factors like memory loss. Modern crises go beyond specific domains and necessitate honing of collective talents too. Modern crisis is the outcome of collective factors and below are the characteristics of modern crises:
• They have huge effects and are influential on a large population. • They trigger high-economic costs and dominate classical prevention talents. • They cause unprecedented, comprehensive and interrelated problems and impact vital resources. • Because of multidimensional reflection phenomenon, they create a snowball dynamic effect. • Emergency systems like old and unused damaging methods react against false traces. • Within this emergency process, excessive ambiguity does not vanish. • In due course threats can go through transformation. • Clustering comes to the stage. • Serious communication problems emerge with reliable corporations, society, media and victims. • All kinds of vital risks may be of question.
To manage a crisis healthily risks should be defined and controlled. According to the narrowest definition, risk is the likelihood of causing the kind of events that have huge negative effects like damages caused by customers, corruption or problems caused by natural phenomenon or human errors. Risks refer to all kinds of events or situations that would prevent the corporation to realize its objectives.
Risk is characterized by the facts below (Günbey, 2008):
• In general, it can never be known or projected truly and clearly (ambiguity). • They change in time. • It is a manageable fact. • They create negative effects on the result.
In most cases, strategies formed within the area of risk communication can be treated within the context of two main strategy approaches as technical approaches and socioculture based strategies that represent the basic risk communication approaches:
Science-Based Risk Communication Strategies
Main features of risk communication strategies that focus on science-technique based approaches can be listed as below:
• In the development of risk communication strategy, experts and affiliated institutions play a role. • Communication strategies are mostly organized unidirectional or bidirectional to persuade target mass by transferring risk related messages in a comprehensible way from the resource to the target mass. • In strategy formation socio-psychological, societal and cultural factors that influence communication processes are included either partially or not included at all. • In risk communication strategies, role and responsibility of resources, or in other words authorized individuals and institutions, which would plan and implement the communication strategy in risk related topics as well as the structure of formal relations between resources and target mass is demonstrated in advance by definitive lines and informal relations are not included into the evaluation process. • It is a central structuring and formal relations that direct intragroup, intergroup communication as well as the communication between groups and individuals. • In this formed strategy, thereis no flexibility that would take evolving conditions into account. • In order to identify the features that would play a role in persuading target mass, more quantitative researches are being conducted (Onay, 2019: 90).
Society-Culture Based Risk Communication Strategies
In society-culture based risk communication strategy the aim is taking public needs, cultural values, viewpoints, expectations, knowledge, experience and interactions into account. By establishing principles and activities that can enable and support social participation and molding flexible plans, it is aimed to improve proper action and response of the public in the face of a risk. Overall objective of risk communication is to prepare the society to respond to risk and in order to do that making the society more active by including in the preparation activities against potential disasters and also in decision-making activities.
In the development of risk communication strategy mostly the values, attitudes, demands and social characteristics of the recipient/target mass play a role.
Reputation Management as a Strategic Tool
The answer to the question of what kind of things are appreciated and extolled by society can be found in values. Value refers to common opinion, goal, basic moral principles or beliefs that are generically accepted as true and necessary by a vast majority of members in a social group or society aiming to continue their existence, unity, function and longevity (Bakaç, 2013: 303). Characteristics of value can be listed as below:
• Uniting facts adopted by the society or individuals. • Criteria that are deemed to meet the social needs of a society and to promote individuals’ wellbeing. • Judgments that relate not only to consciousness but also to feelings and excitements. • Instincts in the consciousness of individuals that steer human behaviors. • A value holds in itself norms but unlike norms values exhibit a more general and abstract character than norms.
The importance of reputation for corporations is increasing every single day. Right now increased value and effectiveness of corporate reputation in regards to environmental dispositions can be summarized as such; (Fombrun and Van Riel, 2003: 2-3):
• Globalization • Accessibility of knowledge • Commodifying the product • Media • Advertisement cluttering or fullness • Shareholder activism
Corporate Identity
In terms of communicative approach, corporate identity is treated as multidimensional methods employed by a corporation while forming communication. In that case it can be argued that the corporate communication concept is grounded on the communication that covers everything said, done or molded by a corporation. There is a decisive
connection between corporate culture and corporate identity. Corporate identity is, “visual and behavioral presentation of the identity of corporation, what it does and how it makes what it does” (Balmer and Wilconson, 1991: 27-28).
A novel model of corporate identity management process built on these models can be explained in line with the concepts below:
• Corporate Identity: consists of corporate philosophy, corporate values and corporate mission. • Corporate Strategyconsists of communication management based products, services, corporate structure and corporate identity format that is aligned with the vision of top management. • Communication Management and Corporate Communication is implemented by the final corporate identity that is a blend of the behaviors of corporate employees and management, symbolism and communication plan. • Marketing Communication, Communication between Communication Management and Individuals, used in transforming the identity owned by various shareholder groups into corporate image. • Corporate Image; At last, corporations who manage to sustain financial performance and work life confidently and successfully have been transformed into corporate reputation. • Environmental Effect; has an effect on all parts of the model. • Corporate Culture; Rather than a variable, it refers to an extensive circle surrounding the entire model (Bayçu, 2019: 102).
Components of Corporate Identity
When corporate identity is mentioned the first thing that comes to mind is visual concepts such as logo, emblem, color of the corporation etc. Yet they are in fact a very tiny portion of corporate identity because corporate identity is a concept with key elements that are far more inclusive. As can also be seen in the figure there are four key elements that make up corporate identity and they are; Corporate philosophy, corporate design, corporate behavior and corporate communication.
Corporate Reputation
The importance of reputation for corporations is increasing every single day. Right now increased value and effectiveness of corporate reputation in regards to environmental dispositions can be summarized as such (Fombrun and Van Riel, 2003: 2-3):
• Globalization • Accessibility of knowledge • Commodifying the product • Media • Advertisement cluttering or fullness • Shareholder activism