Text 1 Corporate communications
Corporate communications aims to maintain and build the reputation of an organization, whether it is a company, an institution or a non-profit organization. The director of corporate communications, or corporate communications officer, defines, develops and assesses the corporate communications strategy with the corporate communications team. The corporate communications strategy involves:
■ defining the organization's values and identity. For example, Vodafone Ireland lists customer orientation and discipline as two of its values
■ identifying and monitoring / tracking issues or potential problems - for example, rumours that mobile phones may cause health problems - which might hurt or damage the organization's reputation
■ communicating with the media, with public officials (for example, government representatives) and with stakeholders. Stakeholders are people who have an interest in the company, such as shareholders, employees, suppliers and the local community. Employees are known as internal publics, whilst suppliers, investors and the media are
examples of external publics.
Corporate values and identity
The mission statement, or statement of purpose and values, is a public declaration of the way theorganization conducts its business, and expresses a commitment to being responsible corporate citizens with high standards of corporate governance - the processes by which an organization is directed and controlled.
Tools of corporate communications:
■ Corporate advertising is advertising about the organization rather than its products or services.
■ Media relations involves developing relationships withjournalists in order to get the company's stories published or broadcast. This includes organizing media tours – guided visits for journalists around a factory, shop or hotel; preparing media kits - documents
presenting information or products to journalists; and drafting press releases – information sent to the media to inform them of company developments. Companies often make this information available on the media centre of their websites.
■ Financial communications includes investor relations - maintaining relationships with people who have invested money in the company - and analyst relations – maintaining relationships with people who analyse the financial performance of the company, such as
journalists or financial analysts.
■ Companies often have an investor relations centre on their corporate website, a website designed for corporate communications and not for communication to the consumer. To announce an Initial Public Offering, the first time the company offers shares for sale to the public, a roadshowcan present the company to investors and analysts.
■ Internal communications informs employees, creates understanding, and aims to change behaviour within the organization. Managers can act as ambassadors to pass on internal messages to their teams. Organizations have a range of channels to deliver messages, such as in-house newsletters (news and information for the people who work in the organization). More recently, internal communicators - that is, the corporate communications team - have started to exploit social media (web-based communications tools) to engage in a two-way exchange with employees. For example, internal discussion forums on intranets (internal internets).
10.1 Match the two parts of the sentences to complete the job advertisements.
Director of Corporate Communications
Responsibilities:
1 The Director of Corporate
2 Actively participate in building the company's reputation among internal and external
3 Assist the VP of Corporate Communications in defining the company's values and identifying
4 Develop and maintain
5 Oversee a wide range of media relations activities including preparing media kits; coordinating media
6 Manage employee communications and manage our in-house
7 Supervise investor
a newsletter and intranet.
b Communications will be responsible for defining and developing the corporate communications strategy.
c publics.
d relations.
e relationships with journalists.
f key issues.
g tours and writing press releases.
Text 2 PR and lobbying
Public relations involves establishing and maintaining goodwill (a good reputation) and understanding between an organization and its publics. Public relations firms are experts in media relations (working with journalists), public affairs (lobbying), and advising on strategy towards public authorities.
Media relations. Public relations firms and agencies can:
■ advise clients on media relations, giving advice on how to build good working relationships with journalists
■ provide media training, teaching people how to work effectively with the media
■ design media kits to give journalists background information on the organization
■ organize press conferences or media briefings to answer questions from journalists
■ write fact sheets with information about a specific topic
■ prepare news releases or press releases - written or recorded statements given to the press.
Lobbying is the process of seeking to influence policy-makers, the people who decide government legislation, and to influence voting. Lobbying is the business of professional lobbyists or public affairs consultants - often former ministers who have contacts with politicians. Many private sector companies, non-profit organizations or even overseas governments employ public relations firms to lobby on their behalf - that is, to promote their interests - to maintain relationships with policy-makers and to influence the decision-making process (how people make decisions). For example, the smoking lobby promotes the interests of tobacco companies.
Inside lobbying. The American Democracy Center defines inside lobbying as making a direct appeal to legislators to support your cause. The objective is to convince policy-makers to speak on your behalf or to be an advocate for your cause - that is, a supporter of your cause. Inside lobbying tools include influencing politicians through campaign contributions (donations to political parties), supplying research and information to support your arguments, and giving testimony (for example, a doctor or other medical expert may give a formal statement about the health dangers of smoking in front of a government committee). Critics argue that lobbying seeks to corrupt the political process by putting private interests (what's best for individuals or corporations) above the public interest (what's best for the general public).
Outside lobbying aims to influence policy by mobilizing public opinion (getting the public behind a cause) or getting activists (members of the public or non-governmental organizations involved in political activity) to put pressure on legislators through letter-writing campaigns or rallies.
10.2 Complete the extract using words from the box. One word can be used twice.
lobbied lobby lobbying lobbyists
Labour and the nuclear (1) ………
How much influence do (2) …… on both sides of the nuclear debate actually have on government policy?
Most industries and large organizations use (3) ….., who have contacts with policy-makers.
The (4) ….. industry has tried to clean up its image following a series
of scandals involving government ministers and their advisers.
French energy giant EDF campaigned to change perceptions of nuclear power. It has successfully (5) …… ministers to build new plants.
10.3 Match the two parts of the sentences.
1 Monsanto used a public relations company to promote their
2 The report confirmed that lobbying does influence the political decision-making
3 An opposition party spokesman fears that campaign
4 The oil industry is lobbying government to influence
a policy-makers concerning regulations for exploiting reserves in Antarctica.
b donations from big business influence government policy.
с interests in the EU. The firm organized a visit to the headquarters in the United States.
d process in the UK.
10.4 Choose the correct words from the brackets to complete the report from a pressure group.
We are continuing our campaign to (1) (mobilize / advise / corrupt)
public opinion. Following the (2) (fact sheet / rally / outside lobbying) in the town centre, we are organizing a further letter-writing (3) (conference / campaign / release) to keep up pressure on our local politicians. Our press (4) (release / contributions / code) generated three articles in the local newspapers. We are getting advice on media (5) (training / bribing /
testimony) so that we will be more convincing when speaking to the press.