Entering this class, I thought a fair definition of
corporate communication might be all communication done by a corporation. Right?
But maybe that’s too broad. After both our readings, I’m concerned it’s not
broad enough.
Couldn’t theories of corporate communication apply to any large organization? Cornelissen works
around this a bit by giving a (secondary) definition of corporate rooted in the
Latin corpus for any “body.” Argenti’s use of the term organizational
communication seems to have nothing to do with whether the body is
involved in profit-making or not. He calls it a discipline “much more closely
allied with management or organizational behavior rather than communication” (p. 82) .
I think this is comparable to Cornelissen’s definition of
corporate communication as a “framework for the effective coordination of all
internal and external communication” (p. 5) . So, it’s not even
the communication itself. It’s the coordination
of that communication. Hell, not even that; just the framework for the coordination!
While I appreciate the distinctions both authors are making
about academic disciplines, the meat, for me, is in separating the types of
corporate communication itself. I’m especially interested in how different
types of companies communicate differently. I think the models that Cornelissen
details in Chapter 2 depend on how much a company markets to end-users, instead
of business-to-business dealing. How publicly visible a company is impacts how
much (and how well) it communicates. As Argenti notes, “industries that have
not been under attack spend as little as possible—until a crisis develops” (p. 89) .
Reading both authors, I kept thinking about what may be the
go-to public relations case study of the century so far, the 2010 Deepwater
Horizon oil spill—or perhaps it’s better known as the BP oil spill? That’s
definitely a part of why it’s so interesting. BP’s response to the disaster was
a classic case of what both authors define as the older-style tactical,
reactive communication. A case study of BP’s preparation and response notes the
importance of “the need for strong stakeholders’ relationship before, during
and after the crisis.”
In the years since the disaster, BP has run a PR blitz of TV ads and a
website touting its commitment to restoring the Gulf of Mexico. Two
questions.
First, does it matter? As Argenti asks, “Does Mobil's
support of Masterpiece Theater or Texaco's support of opera affect consumers at
all?” (p. 95) Is it possible all
of BP’s post-spill efforts don’t amount to a hill of (oil-soaked) beans in the
public eye?
Second, would it have made a difference if BP had tried to
promote a more positive image before the spill? Again, Argenti, discussing a
different oil company and spill: “Oil companies…are not easy for people to
either understand or like. Thus many have since written that any of the good
works that Exxon may have done after the accident was unsuccessful because the
company lacked image credibility among many different constituencies” (p. 90) .
Argenti, P. A. (1996, August). Corporate Communication
as a Discipline : Toward a Definition. Management Communication Quarterly, X(1),
73-97.
Cornelissen, J. (2014). Corporate Communication: A
Guide to Theory & Practice (4th ed.). London: SAGE.
