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In their 2013 book, Conscious Capitalism, Whole Foods Co-CEO John Mackey and Conscious Capitalism, Inc. co-founder Raj Sisodia discuss how the prosperity creating marvels of capitalism are so often misunderstood, maligned, or narrowly defined. We who choose to devote our livelihoods to public relations can well relate to these same frustrations. Whether practitioner or educator, we work in a field commonly associated with publicity, spin, and/or propaganda alongside those who are "good with people" but lack strategic insight, business sense, and an understanding of how the outcomes of stakeholder relationships have a broader impact on society.
Combine public relations with capitalism, and, well, you have a fine mess: Short-term focused, narrow-minded profit-seekers concerned with "a good image" that maximizes stock price and helps sell lots of stuff. Oh, my!
What keeps me going as an educator is the desire for my students to have an experience as change agents in their chosen settings. I am a true believer in the power of capitalism and public relations when together they serve a purpose higher than making a buck.
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How do we recognize effective employee representation with the outside world when we see it? The best way to achieve that focus is through measuring employee influence on corporate reputation.
Ellen Schank, senior manager of reputation leadership at Allstate Insurance, says managing Allstate's reputation is a matter of a multifaceted measurement effort. Data are collected, analyzed, and reported about customer interactions, advertising, social media, investors, analysts, news coverage, and other dimensions that bear on reputation. These dimensions address the outside-in dynamics for managing Allstate's corporate reputation, and these make up the bulk of the measurements.
I believe focused research on the inside-out dynamics of corporate reputation for a variety of organizations is needed. An effective, reliable, and valid research design could be proposed that protects corporate interests and provides much-needed knowledge. We need to know not only how well employees play the role of ambassadors, but more important, what ways of ambassadorship are most effective, when, and why.
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