Building Your Corporate Image: Not Just The Ceo Suite; Main Street
By Bob McGee, Speechwriter and PR Counselor
In the course of developing executive communication strategies for CEOs and others in the C-Suite, PR Leadership Communication executives have often overlooked a very potent tool within their own organizations for propagating the corporate message, and only because the preoccupation is with managing upwards. In the course of this oversight, PR departments are missing a critical component of retail public relations, missing the spot - almost literally - where the rubber meets the road, i.e. those local venues, where senior or middle managers run branches or area management groups; places where those managers are the face of your business in their local communities.
These managers invariably know as much about what’s working in their organizations as the executives two and three steps above them; in many instances their tenures in the business are longer than their CEO’s. They are often members of local organizations, whether Rotary or Lions Clubs, or Chambers of Commerce, or neighborhood improvement associations and business
associations, organizations that frequently are in search of knowledgeable speakers.
Yet so many managers infrequently take advantage of such opportunities for a couple of reasons. They are neither authorized nor encouraged by their own managers or corporate PR departments to speak on behalf of the business to these types of groups, and corporate PR often has a concerted effort underway - whether consciously or unconsciously - to minimize the number of speakers who may appear on behalf of the business. The reason? Easier to manage the message when fewer people are delivering it.
In the course of measuring stakeholder perceptions, exigencies exist locally as well as nationally or internationally; the best organizations are very much attuned to this.
Yet it’s also important to put local issues into the context of a wider picture. Here’s where corporate PR can help:
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Give managers the key tools so that they will be comfortable delivering corporate messages. Give them scripts or bullet points on overall, overarching corporate messages on several key subjects that impact on your stakeholders in ways that intersect with your brand, so that when they’re invited to speak, they feel they are both empowered to speak and prepared to deliver an authorized message.
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Revitalize corporate Speakers’ Bureaus and utilize them to both develop effective local speakers and leverage your community presence. The benefit will be felt by local employees' as well as local managers and community leaders. Most importantly, customers will make a note of it.
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Measure the effectiveness of your brand and key public perceptions at regular intervals on local levels, as well as nationally or internationally; find ways to measure what stakeholders think of your local operations, too.
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Reinforce the effectiveness of your speakers with speech coaching and drills, so that they’re prepared with the roles they’re about to undertake. Start your program slowly; develop it carefully; test your results as you go.
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Create an environment where local managers will relish a local invitation to speak, rather than dread it. Create a culture that leverages your brand with clear concise messages on key issues, where the homework has been done for your messengers; after all, they don’t need another assignment, but they are the face of your business and critical in helping you move the bottom line.
Bob McGee is a corporate speechwriter and PR counselor in North Salem, NY who has developed PR strategies for organizations and written speeches for a variety of CEOs and senior executives. His recent widely-acclaimed book, “The Greatest Ballpark Ever: Ebbets Field and the Story of the Brooklyn
Dodgers,” won the 2005 Dave Moore Award, given annually for the most important book published on baseball during the year.