Pub Date : 2024-02-26DOI: 10.1108/ccij-02-2023-0018
Chiara Valentini, K. Sriramesh
PurposePersonal influence is one of the most powerful strategies to influence publics’ behaviours. Yet, there is scant attention on how personal influence is leveraged for different public relations purposes in different cultural contexts. This study empirically investigates the presence and use of personal influence among Italian public relations professionals.Design/methodology/approachA survey was conducted through a self-administrated, web-based questionnaire and was developed from earlier studies investigating personal influence in public relations literature. Survey participants included public relations professionals across public, non-profit and private sectors.FindingsThe findings empirically show the presence and regular use of personal influence by professionals from all sectors to cultivate interpersonal relationships. Personal influence is considered a personal resource and used to leverage own influencing power. The findings also document four major manifestations of personal influence, which were named: relational closeness strategy, engagement strategy, expertise strategy and added value strategy.Practical implicationsThis study enhances our understanding of personal influence in a specific cultural context and offers strategic insights for international professionals seeking to leverage influence in the socio-political environment of Italy. It also offers elements to improve public relations education and training.Originality/valueThe study offers some preliminary understandings of how Italian professionals leverage their personal influence in their daily public relations activities contributing with empirical evidence to the body of knowledge in public relations.
{"title":"Forms and strategies of personal influence in “public” relations practices: evidence from Italy","authors":"Chiara Valentini, K. Sriramesh","doi":"10.1108/ccij-02-2023-0018","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/ccij-02-2023-0018","url":null,"abstract":"PurposePersonal influence is one of the most powerful strategies to influence publics’ behaviours. Yet, there is scant attention on how personal influence is leveraged for different public relations purposes in different cultural contexts. This study empirically investigates the presence and use of personal influence among Italian public relations professionals.Design/methodology/approachA survey was conducted through a self-administrated, web-based questionnaire and was developed from earlier studies investigating personal influence in public relations literature. Survey participants included public relations professionals across public, non-profit and private sectors.FindingsThe findings empirically show the presence and regular use of personal influence by professionals from all sectors to cultivate interpersonal relationships. Personal influence is considered a personal resource and used to leverage own influencing power. The findings also document four major manifestations of personal influence, which were named: relational closeness strategy, engagement strategy, expertise strategy and added value strategy.Practical implicationsThis study enhances our understanding of personal influence in a specific cultural context and offers strategic insights for international professionals seeking to leverage influence in the socio-political environment of Italy. It also offers elements to improve public relations education and training.Originality/valueThe study offers some preliminary understandings of how Italian professionals leverage their personal influence in their daily public relations activities contributing with empirical evidence to the body of knowledge in public relations.","PeriodicalId":504506,"journal":{"name":"Corporate Communications: An International Journal","volume":"38 16","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-02-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140431674","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-02-20DOI: 10.1108/ccij-08-2023-0117
Andreas Schwarz, A. Diers-Lawson
PurposeThis study aims to contribute to strategic crisis communication research by exploring international media representations of third sector crises and crisis response; expanding the range of crisis types beyond transgressions; and developing a framework that integrates framing and crisis communication theory.Design/methodology/approachQuantitative content analysis was applied to identify patterns in crisis reporting of 18 news media outlets in Canada, Germany, India, Switzerland, UK and US. Using an inductive framing approach, crisis coverage of nonprofit organizations (NPOs) and intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) between 2015 and 2018 was analyzed across a wide range of crises, including but not limited to prominent cases such as Oxfam, Kids Company, or the Islamic Research Foundation.FindingsThe news media in six countries report more internal crises in the third sector than external crises. The most frequent crisis types were fraud and corruption, sexual violence/personal exploitation and attacks on organizations. Exploratory factor analysis revealed three components of crisis response strategies quoted in the media, conditional rebuild, defensive and justified denial strategies. Causal attributions and conditional rebuild strategies significantly influenced media evaluations of organizational crisis response. Three frames of third sector crises were detected; the critique, the damage and the victim frame. These frames emphasize different crisis types, causes, crisis response strategies and evaluations of crisis response.Originality/valueThe study reveals the particularities of crises and crisis communication in the third sector and identifies factors that influence mediated portrayals of crises and crisis response strategies of nonprofit organizations (NPOs) from an international comparative perspective. The findings have relevant implications for crisis communication theory and practice.
{"title":"Mediated crises and strategic crisis communication of third sector organizations: a content analysis of crisis reporting in six countries","authors":"Andreas Schwarz, A. Diers-Lawson","doi":"10.1108/ccij-08-2023-0117","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/ccij-08-2023-0117","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeThis study aims to contribute to strategic crisis communication research by exploring international media representations of third sector crises and crisis response; expanding the range of crisis types beyond transgressions; and developing a framework that integrates framing and crisis communication theory.Design/methodology/approachQuantitative content analysis was applied to identify patterns in crisis reporting of 18 news media outlets in Canada, Germany, India, Switzerland, UK and US. Using an inductive framing approach, crisis coverage of nonprofit organizations (NPOs) and intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) between 2015 and 2018 was analyzed across a wide range of crises, including but not limited to prominent cases such as Oxfam, Kids Company, or the Islamic Research Foundation.FindingsThe news media in six countries report more internal crises in the third sector than external crises. The most frequent crisis types were fraud and corruption, sexual violence/personal exploitation and attacks on organizations. Exploratory factor analysis revealed three components of crisis response strategies quoted in the media, conditional rebuild, defensive and justified denial strategies. Causal attributions and conditional rebuild strategies significantly influenced media evaluations of organizational crisis response. Three frames of third sector crises were detected; the critique, the damage and the victim frame. These frames emphasize different crisis types, causes, crisis response strategies and evaluations of crisis response.Originality/valueThe study reveals the particularities of crises and crisis communication in the third sector and identifies factors that influence mediated portrayals of crises and crisis response strategies of nonprofit organizations (NPOs) from an international comparative perspective. The findings have relevant implications for crisis communication theory and practice.","PeriodicalId":504506,"journal":{"name":"Corporate Communications: An International Journal","volume":"158 ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-02-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140449008","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-02-12DOI: 10.1108/ccij-07-2023-0101
Minhee Choi, Baobao Song
PurposeBased on Lasswell’s communication model, this study investigates how four categories of factors (i.e. the source, content, medium and receiver) conjointly affect the relational, financial and social outcomes (i.e. what effect) of CSA communication.Design/methodology/approachWith a survey (N = 366), this study found configurations of core CSA communication factors leading to three different CSA communication outcomes.FindingsWhile this study found multiways to yield three different CSA outcomes, combinational logic indicated the combined effects from source, content, medium and receiver. With content and medium, individuals’ connectedness (receiver) to a CSA issue is a core factor leading to a high level of purchase intention and issue advocacy. This study also found that message strategies (i.e. informativeness, factual tone, no promotional tone) are core factors leading to a high level of trust and issue advocacy.Practical implicationsWith the theoretical guidance, this research contributes to strategic communication practice for various entities involved in advocacy communication by enabling an improved understanding of advocacy communication factors and triggering different communication outcomes.Originality/valueAs CSA communication involves multiple strategies, conventional research agenda focusing on correlational and path analysis approaches provide limited understanding of communication practice. To fill this void, this study adopts a configurational approach to understand current CSA communication practices holistically.
{"title":"Organized complexity of CSA communication strategy","authors":"Minhee Choi, Baobao Song","doi":"10.1108/ccij-07-2023-0101","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/ccij-07-2023-0101","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeBased on Lasswell’s communication model, this study investigates how four categories of factors (i.e. the source, content, medium and receiver) conjointly affect the relational, financial and social outcomes (i.e. what effect) of CSA communication.Design/methodology/approachWith a survey (N = 366), this study found configurations of core CSA communication factors leading to three different CSA communication outcomes.FindingsWhile this study found multiways to yield three different CSA outcomes, combinational logic indicated the combined effects from source, content, medium and receiver. With content and medium, individuals’ connectedness (receiver) to a CSA issue is a core factor leading to a high level of purchase intention and issue advocacy. This study also found that message strategies (i.e. informativeness, factual tone, no promotional tone) are core factors leading to a high level of trust and issue advocacy.Practical implicationsWith the theoretical guidance, this research contributes to strategic communication practice for various entities involved in advocacy communication by enabling an improved understanding of advocacy communication factors and triggering different communication outcomes.Originality/valueAs CSA communication involves multiple strategies, conventional research agenda focusing on correlational and path analysis approaches provide limited understanding of communication practice. To fill this void, this study adopts a configurational approach to understand current CSA communication practices holistically.","PeriodicalId":504506,"journal":{"name":"Corporate Communications: An International Journal","volume":"80 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-02-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139842647","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-02-12DOI: 10.1108/ccij-07-2023-0101
Minhee Choi, Baobao Song
PurposeBased on Lasswell’s communication model, this study investigates how four categories of factors (i.e. the source, content, medium and receiver) conjointly affect the relational, financial and social outcomes (i.e. what effect) of CSA communication.Design/methodology/approachWith a survey (N = 366), this study found configurations of core CSA communication factors leading to three different CSA communication outcomes.FindingsWhile this study found multiways to yield three different CSA outcomes, combinational logic indicated the combined effects from source, content, medium and receiver. With content and medium, individuals’ connectedness (receiver) to a CSA issue is a core factor leading to a high level of purchase intention and issue advocacy. This study also found that message strategies (i.e. informativeness, factual tone, no promotional tone) are core factors leading to a high level of trust and issue advocacy.Practical implicationsWith the theoretical guidance, this research contributes to strategic communication practice for various entities involved in advocacy communication by enabling an improved understanding of advocacy communication factors and triggering different communication outcomes.Originality/valueAs CSA communication involves multiple strategies, conventional research agenda focusing on correlational and path analysis approaches provide limited understanding of communication practice. To fill this void, this study adopts a configurational approach to understand current CSA communication practices holistically.
{"title":"Organized complexity of CSA communication strategy","authors":"Minhee Choi, Baobao Song","doi":"10.1108/ccij-07-2023-0101","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/ccij-07-2023-0101","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeBased on Lasswell’s communication model, this study investigates how four categories of factors (i.e. the source, content, medium and receiver) conjointly affect the relational, financial and social outcomes (i.e. what effect) of CSA communication.Design/methodology/approachWith a survey (N = 366), this study found configurations of core CSA communication factors leading to three different CSA communication outcomes.FindingsWhile this study found multiways to yield three different CSA outcomes, combinational logic indicated the combined effects from source, content, medium and receiver. With content and medium, individuals’ connectedness (receiver) to a CSA issue is a core factor leading to a high level of purchase intention and issue advocacy. This study also found that message strategies (i.e. informativeness, factual tone, no promotional tone) are core factors leading to a high level of trust and issue advocacy.Practical implicationsWith the theoretical guidance, this research contributes to strategic communication practice for various entities involved in advocacy communication by enabling an improved understanding of advocacy communication factors and triggering different communication outcomes.Originality/valueAs CSA communication involves multiple strategies, conventional research agenda focusing on correlational and path analysis approaches provide limited understanding of communication practice. To fill this void, this study adopts a configurational approach to understand current CSA communication practices holistically.","PeriodicalId":504506,"journal":{"name":"Corporate Communications: An International Journal","volume":"36 8","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-02-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139782520","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-01-30DOI: 10.1108/ccij-10-2023-0142
Sarah Marschlich, Laura Bernet
PurposeCorporations are confronted with growing demands to take a stand on socio-political issues, i.e. corporate social advocacy (CSA), which affects their reputation in the public. Companies use different CSA message strategies, including calling the public to support and act on the issue they advocate. Using reactance theory, the authors investigate the impact of CSA messages with a call to action on corporate reputation in the case of a company's gender equality initiative.Design/methodology/approachA one-factorial (CSA message with or without a call to action) between-subjects experiment was conducted by surveying 172 individuals living in Switzerland. The CSA messages were created in the context of gender equality.FindingsThe authors' study indicates that CSA messages with a call to action compared to those without overall harmed corporate reputation due to individuals' reactance, which is higher for CSA messages with a call to action, negatively affecting corporate reputation. The impact of the CSA message strategy with a call to action on corporate reputation remains significant after controlling for issue alignment and political leaning.Originality/valueCommunicating about socio-political issues, especially taking a stand, is a significant challenge for corporations in an increasingly polarized society and has often led to backlash, boycotts and damage to corporate reputation. This study shows that the possible adverse effects of advocating for socio-political issues can be related to reactance. It emphasizes that companies advocating for contested issues must be more cautious about the message strategy than the issue itself.
{"title":"Corporate social advocacy and gender equality: how call-to-action messages influence corporate reputation","authors":"Sarah Marschlich, Laura Bernet","doi":"10.1108/ccij-10-2023-0142","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/ccij-10-2023-0142","url":null,"abstract":"PurposeCorporations are confronted with growing demands to take a stand on socio-political issues, i.e. corporate social advocacy (CSA), which affects their reputation in the public. Companies use different CSA message strategies, including calling the public to support and act on the issue they advocate. Using reactance theory, the authors investigate the impact of CSA messages with a call to action on corporate reputation in the case of a company's gender equality initiative.Design/methodology/approachA one-factorial (CSA message with or without a call to action) between-subjects experiment was conducted by surveying 172 individuals living in Switzerland. The CSA messages were created in the context of gender equality.FindingsThe authors' study indicates that CSA messages with a call to action compared to those without overall harmed corporate reputation due to individuals' reactance, which is higher for CSA messages with a call to action, negatively affecting corporate reputation. The impact of the CSA message strategy with a call to action on corporate reputation remains significant after controlling for issue alignment and political leaning.Originality/valueCommunicating about socio-political issues, especially taking a stand, is a significant challenge for corporations in an increasingly polarized society and has often led to backlash, boycotts and damage to corporate reputation. This study shows that the possible adverse effects of advocating for socio-political issues can be related to reactance. It emphasizes that companies advocating for contested issues must be more cautious about the message strategy than the issue itself.","PeriodicalId":504506,"journal":{"name":"Corporate Communications: An International Journal","volume":"85 ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-01-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140485135","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
京公网安备 11010802042870号
京ICP备2023020795号-1
扫码关注我们
求助内容：
应助结果提醒方式：