Introduction to Corporate
Communication
Chapter One
(1)
Inas A.Hamid
Modern organizations operate through different
departments charged with community relations,
government relations, customer relations, labor
relations, human resources both at the
corporate level and at the business unit level.
Also they have various stakeholders who play a
role in achieving the organizations, objectives.
Organizations use communication to communicate
with these targets to achieve their objectives.
The Public
Customer
s
Employee
s
Top
Top management
management
Production
Production Unit
Unit
Media
HR
HR
Finance
Finance
Government
PR
PR
Custome
Custome
rr
Service
Service
Investors
Corporate communication is the total
communication activity generated by a
company and directed at all relevant target
groups to achieve its planned objectives and
create favorable relationships with
stakeholders on which the company depends.
Each item of communication must convey and
emphasize the corporate point of view and its
identity
Corporate Communication
Why do corporations need to develop
effective communication?
Organizations need communication to :
Acquire resources they need in order to
operate.
Communicate with different stakeholders.
Communication with employees to increase
their loyalty.
Influence the environment within which they
operate.
Retain their license to operate.
Improve the image.
Encourage all employees to work together to
support the company's objectives.
Develop the corporate branding.
In all organizations, communication flows as the following:
vertically and horizontally
internally : linking employees internally to each other, to various
layers of management.
Externally with different targets (customers, government, resource
holders ) .
formally and informally : which means not all communications in an
organization are work related or aiming at fulfilling organizational
objectives.
In this course we will focus on the formal
communications that link internal and
external audiences of the organizations.
Corporate
Communicatio
ns
Vertical &
Horizontal
Help the
organization to :
- Create Images
- Build a strong
brand
- Develop
Reputation
Internal &
External
Formal &
Informal
Management
Comm.
Organizational
Comm.
Marketing
Comm.
1-Management communication: It is the
most
strategic communication.
Communication is one of the most
important skills a manager must have to :
gain the acceptance for the organization's
goals.
Develop a shared vision of the company
within the organization.
Establish and maintain trust in the
organization's leadership.
Initiate and manage the change process.
Communication specialist are needed to
support managers in improving the
effectiveness of their communications.
2- Organizational Communications
Communications between the organization and
its audiences (investors, the public, share
holders, financial journalist, investment analyst,
regulators, legislators.).
Do not directly aim at generating sales but
at developing long term relationship.
Apply a different style of communication:
messages are more formal and honest.
Initiated by external parties and that
means the audiences decide whether the
organization should communicate with them.
3- Marketing communication
MarCom is very important to support
management communications.
MarCom gets the bulk of the budget in most
organizations.
Traditionally termed promotion.
It is a part of the 4Ps marketing mix (product,
price and place).
It aims at facilitating the process of exchange.
The organizations choose the target market and
avoid communicating with those that are not
commercially interesting.
Marketing communication: all forms
of communication between an
organization and its customers and
potential customers, that facilitate
exchanges by establishing shared
meaning with the brands customers or
clients.
Marketing communications Mix
Public
Relations
Packaging
Sponsorship
Advertising
Word
Of
mouth
Consumer
audiences
Channel
Audiences
All
Stakeholders
Audiences
Exhibitions
Internal
Marketing
Websites
Sales
Promotion
Branding
Personal
Selling
Branding
Tools of corporate communication
The most important practices to achieve
Corporate integrated communications
are:
Use of integrated marketing communications
(IMC).
Application of visual identity systems (house
style).
Depending on team works.
Adoption of a centralized planning system.
1- Integrated Marketing Communications
In recent years organizations become aware
of the need to produce consistent
messages (free of contradictions) and this
what we can call Integrated marketing
communication to describe a process for
building a fully coordinated
communication system inside the
organization.
Moore & Thorson (1996) suggest that integrated
marketing communication (IMC) can be achieved by:
2- Visual identity Systems
To produce consistent themes on products
and services through the use of common
names, logos, sounds, packaging, furniture,
building design and even smells.
This led to the emergence of identity
firms that help the organization to develop
a uniform set of symbols, guidelines for
employees to create a uniform image for
the organization(clothing, way of
greetings.).
3-Coordinated teams work groups
4-Communication planning system
(CPS)
It is a software that can be used to
set up and manage communication projects
targeted to internal and external audiences.
Manage and control at a general level by
providing employees with certain information.
Offers standard structure of reports that can be
used in various situations.
Types of communication in organizations
Gruing & Hunt (1984)developed four types of PR
practices focusing on the nature of communication
in different organizations.
These types are :
Press agent- propaganda
Public information
Two way asymmetric communication.
Two way symmetric communication.
According to Gruing point of view:
The first model propaganda is the least
desirable form of communication because:
it involves a one-way flow of information.
The organization is not honest about its
activities and it effects on the community.
They will also resist efforts to establish a
dialogue about it.
The fourth is the best type.
It involves a company in two-way symmetric
communication.
Under this model, both parties are open and
truthful about each other's point of view to
arrive at a common understanding.
Types
Press agent
propaganda
Public
information
Purpose
Propaganda
Transmit facts Feedback &
persuasion
Mutual
understandi
ng
Communication
One-way ,little
respect to
truth
- One-way - truthful,
complete
facts
Two-way , in
favor of the
sender,
accurate info.
Tow-way
,balance
interest.
Type of
organization
Entertainment
& sport
Organizations
-Non- Profit&
PR agencies,
competing
Organizations
,
pharmaceutic
al
organizations.
governmental
organizations
-Instructions
about health
and safety
procedures
given to
employees.
Two-way
asymmetric
Two-way
symmetric
Identity
Brand
Communication policies
Apply PPT model
Apply KAB model
Common starting
points
Strategy
Effective Corporate communication
Depends on ensuring that the organization's
communications policies are derived from the core strategyidentity-brand (SIB) to develop a set of common starting
points
The corporate strategy can be translated into
common starting points by applying the PPT
model as : indicate what the organization
wants to Promise to its most important internal
and external stakeholders; indicate how it
expects to Prove it ; and identify what Tone of
voice it wants to use to communicate
messages to those audiences.
Make plans more specific by applying the KAB
model as: specify what the organization wants
target groups to know (knowledge), to feel
(attitude)and to do (Behavior), both with
respect to the entire company and with respect
to the individual business unit.
Assignment
What will happen if the organizations'
departments are not coordinated in the way
of creating consistency messages?
How can organizations limit fragmentation
in their communications?
