Seat at the Table

When the Harvard Business Review (HBR) writes on a public relations and reputation related topic, pay attention.  It’s probably a good example of how to think and counsel at a senior executive business level.  Their latest article,  Reputation and Its Risks (Feb 07), is no exception. 

I’ve previously written about the importance of public relations professionals being able to provide business counsel as opposed to PR counsel.  This article comes at it from both direction by showing how the business manager needs to understand the reputation risk of certain business moves.  Likewise, the reputation manager (e.g., Corporate Communications team) needs to be able to analyze and quantify that risk. 

I’ve often done a light version of this for the clients using point of view (PoV) memos.  We analyze the different variables that affecting reputation and show how proposed business moves (e.g., an edgy ad campaign, a new type of product, CEO compensation) may impact reputation.  These PoV memos are then used as part of the go/no-go decisions or to adjust the business strategy.

The HBR article lays out internal situations that could raise the level of risk.  Some situations, like a reputation-reality gap, will be familiar to PR pros (a gap analysis is a standard part of a reputation counseling program).   Other situations, such as preparing for changing expectations and understanding the impact of weak internal coordination, are less common.   The latter two require an in-depth understanding both companies and the mindset of audiences.  I rarely see companies and their corporate communications teams invest the time to fully understand the inner business workings or companies invest the money to properly survey audiences on an ongoing basis.  However, part of the problem may be that the risk management aspect of these activities are not commonly laid out in executive business terms (as this article does).

The article is well worth the purchase price of $6.  At the very least, it’s a solid example of how to communicate public relations counsel in the language of business.  Something that is rarely done.

Note: The Wall Street Journal provides a good short summary of the piece here.  Purchase and download the HBR article here.