CORPORATE COMMUNICATION AND ITS IMPLICATIONS ON THE ROMANIAN BUSINESS ENVIRONEMENT Hristache Diana Andreia Ungureanu Roxana Lucia Academy of Economic Studies, PiaĠa Romană no. 6, sector 1, Bucharest, tel. 021/3191900-int. 208, E-mail:
[email protected];
[email protected] Corporate communication represents a true challenge for changing Romanian companies’ image, at the age of European Union Integration. Companies will never be satisfied with the mere spread of information. It has to find the means and the strategies to surprise its business partners. The present paper aims to show that, through corporate communication, any organizations builds up the premises of making its image and identity public, all this within a society whose modernism is determined precisely by global communication. Key words: corporate communication, organizational values, corporate image, corporate messages A company’s performances, success or notoriety do not exist unless they are shared by its public. The art of communicating ideas, images, politics and strategies, that of selling goods and services is realized by activating corporate communication at the company’s level. The social, economic, political and cultural changes that marked the second half of the 20th century made the company of the third millennium beginning consider the need for communication a real strategy, mean to emphasize its social awareness. It tries to integrate the company into the modern society based on global communication. D’Humières P. (1994) considers corporate communication „... as a strategically development that frames the organizational territory within modern society’s globalism.” We can consider that this is the way to ensure the conditions of a functional relationship between company, business environment and society. Through corporate communication, we can ensure the cohesion of a company’s specific identity with the set of rules, norms and values that define modern society. These are the coordinates Romanian companies must also follow. The challenge is even greater now, that Romania has become full member of the European Union. Quantifying communication within an organization implies two ways of acting: internal and external corporate communication. Internal communication process implies the need for a flexible, dynamic exchange of messages, using a feed-back system. Getting, decoding and using these messages determine a certain attitudes for the company’s employees, attitude that depends on the economic and social circumstances. Therefore, we need corporate communication, as it ensures employees are stimulates and they adhere to the company’s goals and objectives. Hence, Romanian companies will have to develop their corporate image, and this image will be adjusted and improved by the organizational values shared by its employees: responsibility, professionalism, team spirit. Developing corporate communication means interacting with the employees. Harrington H.J., Harrington J.S. (2000), quoted by Hristache D. (2004), bring, as argument, the need to establish a starshaped communication between a company’s departments. „This five-ways or star-shaped communication process is an important component of a participative structure, of a team based on a client-company strong relationship. (...) Every employee has to manage personally the communication network within his own star. Every employee is connected to at least for of the five angles of the star. The necessary actions to be done in order to make the five-ways communication process function efficiently are the following: using managers to spread information to employees, information that was kept initially at the high levels of management; implementing the communication system; training employees to use efficiently the communication system; establishing an awards system in order to encourage the use of the communication system within the company.” Nowadays, technology together with the employees’ personal initiatives can easily solve the communication problems. Moreover, developing relationships with business partners and continuously assessing the market players competition are complementarily improving the global image of corporate communication. The use of this communication system becomes a must for Romanian companies, too. We consider corporate value based on trust another essential component of the development of an efficient communication system within Romanian companies. It develops interhuman, professional relationships within the company as well as corporate relations.
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Inside the company, the communication process can be interpreted in many ways, depending on its goals. Employees’ trust can be won only by creating the adequate communication environment for the suitable ways of behaving in certain situations at certain moments. Avoiding employees’ manipulation is also important as it avoids tensed situations, work conflicts and the establishment of corporate models which can have a negative impact both on employees and on business partners. By combining communication, creativity and trust, we broaden the corporate values area. Thus, we can establish a profitable corporate strategy. Here, corporate culture and structure influence each other, becoming major strategic components. “Why do companies need a corporate culture?” Because it represents a life style. It confers at the same time corporate personality and identity. Corporate communication with the external environment develops gradually, based on the set of practices, uses, behavior norms, values, hopes and faiths developed under the influence of internal communication. We notice that, in the Romanian business environment, companies are frequently dual in conceiving and/or communicating their corporate culture. We have paradoxically, the so-called “real corporate culture” – strictly related to the implemented corporate procedures and the “image corporate culture” that tries to improve the corporate image, to adjust it in front of business partners and clients, according to foreign models. Moreover, there is an important segment of Romanian companies that have not developed yet their own corporate culture. The need to implement a corporate culture, no matter the company’s size or tradition is obvious. The different managerial paradigms sometimes referred to as metaphors – professionalism, team spirit, transparency- reveal the communicational variety of corporate management. G.Morgan (1996) argues that we need “to embrace different perspectives, as there is not a single theory or metaphor to offer us a comprehensive point of view and there cannot be a to organize the whole activity” “What do Romanian companies lack?” A concern for motivation, loyalty and creativity. Activating one of the values mentioned above is not enough, the whole set is needed. Afterwards, corporate culture maturity will be expressed through the corporate symbol. We named this way the image type of communication between company and the internal and external environment. It refers to the ambient design built by the company, expressed through the corporate sculpture. Building’s architecture, the concern for an adequate interior design, dominant colors and logo will communicate company’s identity. Business success is strictly related to the type of corporate culture a company can adopt. (fig.1) Fig.1. Types of corporate culture mission A.C.C. norms & values system
symbols
M.D.C.C. Corporate culture components
myths
professional ablilites & managerial attitudes
H.F.D.C.C.
professional ablilites & employees’ attitudes
R.D.C.C.
ideology
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Legend fig. 1: − A.C.C. = authoritative corporate culture − M.D.C.C. = management-directed corporate culture (scenarios, roles) − H.F.D.C.C. = human factor-directed corporate culture − R.D.C.C. = responsibilities-directed corporate culture When corporate communication process aims the external public, the company will need to act in two directions: establishing business contacts and promoting a quality relationship with different public categories. The correct emphasis of communicational aspects needs an approach based on the particularity of corporate objectives, the area of corporate action and the types of models and techniques used. Knowing its corporate musts, the company will consolidate its image and size using other forms of communication, too: social, financial and institutional. It is therefore a modern means that refers to company’s concern for adding more value to its goods and services, in order to reach its commercial goals. At the same time, it will study and qualify the public’s degree of satisfaction. Corporate communication also influences the relationship between the company and its target public. It shows it is open and takes into account its public’s expectations in order to ensure its moral legitimacy and its social integrity. (A.Rogojanu, D.Hristache, Al.Taúnadi, 2004) Corporate image has to take as departure point the corporate system of its identity, its activity object and its area. Corporate communication will emphasize through an adequate information system, the real performances of the company. Corporate image will be complete by its product’s image. Identifying the product’s brand with corporate image implies emphasizing the set of norms and values established within the corporate culture. For instance: When we say„Nike”, we say – tenacity, quality, dynamism, competitivity. When we identify „Channel” goods, we communicate with the prestige image of this fashion house. Communicating through brand serves both to the commercial side and to business, to its position on the market. The better brand represents the commercial side, the more it tends to get integrated in the corporate size. Thus, economic reasons combine image ones and, according to G.Debord (1992), „...the corporate name will be the name of the promoted product, in other words, the superior position gained through its notoriety will allow the establishment of a tight relationship between business environment and the corporate one.” The company’s particularity is determined by the corporate communication particularities. This particularity of the communication process is identified through a series of corporate messages that will send information to business environment and to civil society. These messages are: corporate speeches – informational priority is directed towards the company-client relationship; speeches meant to activate the internal public – increase the importance of business development process; speeches meant to support corporate performance – maintain the equilibrium of its social, economic and institutional values; corporate speeches, where technical performances support the social ones, trying to get a higher position for the company, to make it a leader in the public’s eyes. According to the communication types of behaviors emphasized, we can reveal a series of strategies that the company can use: identification strategy, the legitimity one, the informational one and the leadership one. Besides corporate strategies, the company’s advertising strategy is also present. Corporate publicity needs a different understanding and treatment than commercial advertising. “If commercial advertising aims to attract the attention of the general public, corporate publicity wants to persuade. It is involved in this both with the product and with reality. Commercial advertising supports the product’s creative, while corporate publicity supports the company’s values system through the promoted product.” (R.Debray, 1992) For instance, Leo Burnett Worldwide new corporate identity proves once again that we need corporate communication. Although it is a well-known company on advertising Romanian market, it felt the need for a change, for a new way of communicating its corporate philosophy. It passed from the symbol of a hand rising towards the sky full of stars that represented the metaphor of its team work and creativity, to the corporate symbol of the black pencil with the signature of the company’s founder on it. The black pencil symbolizes the team’s inspiration, originality, desire to work and creativity. The new image used also as secondary logo on the materials used for corporate promotion ensures the uniqueness and atractivity of this company’s communication through image process. In conclusion, it seems that the age when communication techniques were seen as mere auxiliaries of corporate development has passed. A modernity’s phenomenon, it generates an activating effect and becomes a means of building a new image and a new perspective for the company. It supports company’s efforts to fulfill the assumed responsibilities at community level, even if is premature to state that these changes can be found within most of the companies activating in the Romanian business environment.
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