• “When we're talking to investors or regulators or policymakers, they want to hear the enterprise. When it comes to consumers, it's the brands that matter most.”
• “Product brands can't hide behind a corporate brand anymore, and corporate brands can't hide from a product problem. People are smart about brands.”
• “Investors understand the value of brand, and if you have investors that don't, then like, go find new investors.”
• “Every company will have ups and downs. So the question is, does your do your investors trust your management team and the way that you solve problems.”
• “The more marketers understand communications, and the more communicators understand marketing, the greater impact you can have.”
• “Employee engagement today is so different than it was way back when. Employees have a voice, and they're using it very clearly with senior leaders.”
• “As divided as the world is, right now, if you think that your employee base isn't similarly divided, you're you've got your head in the sand.”
  “Suddenly, with AI, every employee is a communicator. They can make content. Which is exciting and great and wonderful. And also the scariest thing in the world.”
• “I think as a communicator, your number one job is to preserve your company's freedom to operate, and that means you have to maintain trust above all else.”
• “The value of running crisis exercises ahead of time is that you can begin to have some perspective before you lose it.”
  
  

While different stakeholders may have different expectations when it comes to corporate brand, there is now widespread understanding that corporate brand is crucial to companies'“license to operate” and to providing resilience when crisis hits, according to a panel discussion at this week's PRovoke Global in Chicago, moderated by Kristine Boyden, Americas CEO for Burson.

The companies represented on the panel have different approaches to their corporate and product brands, but all are convinced that corporate brand is critically important in communicating with stakeholders and in ensuring reputation resilience when crisis strkee.

At Logitech, new CEO Hanneke Faber has been consolidating various brands, such as Jaybird, Ultimate Ears, Wonderboom, and Yeti,“so that we were going to be a single brand company,” says Amanda Glasgow, the company's chief communications officer.“The advantage of that is we only have one brand that we have to talk about, and your marketing dollars go a lot further.

“The risk is you don't have one or the other to hide behind it if something goes wrong.”

General Mills, by contrast, is a“house of brands,” according to Jano Cabrera, chief communications officer, who adds:“Coming from politics, I just don't see the tension. The reality is, most campaigns win if they're very clear on what they're communicating to who.” So messages are tailored to specific audiences.

“When it comes to General Mills telling our sustainability story, or that we use 100% recyclable energy, or that our packaging will be 100% recyclable, most consumers actually don't care. But when we're talking to investors or regulators or policymakers, they want to hear the enterprise. When it comes to consumers, it's the brands that matter most.”

Melissa Brotz, senior VP of global marketing and external affairs at Abbott, offers a slightly different perspective:“I think you have to define your corporate brand and what it means, and then understand your product brands and how they confer value to your corporate brand and vice versa. And that relationship is going to define your go-to-market strategy.

“I would say that product brands can't hide behind a corporate brand anymore, and corporate brands can't hide from a product problem. People are smart about brands. Social media is everywhere. Journalists will talk about the company. If you study any crisis that often it's the corporate brand that gets the harder hit than the product brand, because they hold the corporation responsible for the actions that either led to the crisis or for fixing the crisis. So I just think it's inextricable no matter.”

Addressing Cabrera's point about investors and other stakeholders being more interested in the corporate brand than consumers, Brotz adds:“There's not an argument about whether corporate brand matters with most investors. I think they understand that it's the essence of how a company will behave in any situation, whether it has a product issue, governance issue. And I think that working on the sustainability side, investors ask us a lot of questions about sustainability, which is not just environment, it's also about our governance and how we serve our customers.

“They know the value of a corporate brand.”

Glasgow agrees:“They understand the value of brand, and if you have investors that don't, then like, go find new investors.”

But she warns against completely different messaging for different stakeholders:“I think the maybe the part that's left unsaid is investors are also customers, like at Logitech investors are also gamers. They may also have a not ideal work experience, crowded with T-Rex arms on a plane, and they still need products for that. So we have to be able to deliver more than one message at once.

“If an investor goes into a store and has a great experience with our brand, that's a little bit of our secret sauce.”

For the investor audience in particular, management credibility is key. Says Brotz:“Your management team and their credibility is probably the number one thing. Because every company will have ups and downs. So the question is, does your do your investors trust your management team and the way that you solve problems, and so from a communication standpoint it is critical to keep that credibility of the management team and their problem solving skills.”

She emphasizes the importance of“actions versus words. Narratives are super important, don't get me wrong, but you have to have that credibility, and the credibility does come from management, and managing through things.”

And Brotz, whose role encompasses communications, marketing, and sustainability, pointed to the benefits of that structure:“You can have integrated teams on everything. And we do. We have integrated teams on almost every initiative in almost every part of my organization, comms and marketing are inseparable.

“This is something I really stress with my teams, the more marketers understand communications, and the more communicators understand marketing, the greater impact you can have. I would say it's been our secret sauce for some time now. Sometimes there can be tension. People often don't want to push back on each other if they feel like they're not the expert on something, but I would much rather have folks get in, roll up their sleeves and debate things and come out with better ideas.

“For us, it really is about integrated teams and getting the best out of all of the voices that are that are at the table.”

While investors and consumers are both important audiences for corporate brand messaging, in a polarized world, employees can be the most challenging stakeholder group.

“Employee engagement today is so different than it was way back when. Employees have a voice, and they're using it very clearly with senior leaders,” says Cabrera.

“When I think of the corporate brand specifically, I think you get in trouble when employees feel that the corporate brand is at odds with the tensions of today. At General Mills after the murder of George Floyd, which took place about three miles from headquarters, we had earnings the next day and our CEO was the first CEO to say black lives matter and it was important for employees to see our leaders speaking out.

“But flash forward several years, inevitably, there's going to be something where they feel that there's a disconnect or dissonance between what they want to hear from a leader and what the leaders are saying. So when October 7 happened, we had a number of employees who wanted us to speak out one way or another.”

Having created the expectation in the first instance, there was more pressure to take a position on the second.“We need to have this conversation where you should speak out as a corporation. We've convened what we call courageous conversations, which is small employee groups, to kind of get the venom out, to understand what the perspective is.”

Adds Glasgow:“I love the idea of courageous conversations. We want to steal that from you. But I think as divided as the world is, right now, if you think that your employee base isn't similarly divided, you're you've got your head in the sand.

“I came to Logitech very recently so we have yet to have one of these watershed moments. So you can check back with me and see how I do. But I think the thing to remember is you have to be clear about where your company does and doesn't have an obligation and the permission to speak. I think it is easy for companies to get caught up in cultural waves and feel like they want to get pulled into conversations.

“But for Logitech, two of our founding values as a company are sustainability in the environment and equality. And so when those issues come up, she will speak out. But if it's not in that space, I'm not sure anybody needs to hear from us. And sometimes employees are asking why we aren't saying something about this? And I think the answer has to be that we don't have permission to have an opinion on this.

There is also, as Brotz points out, an international dimension of these questions.“We have 114,000 employees in 160 countries. And so sometimes we get focused on the US and the divisions here. Multiply that by 160 countries and you are going to offend someone about every topic.

“So we have spoken to our employees about various issues over time, but I would say that in general, we focus on uniting our employees around our purpose, helping people live healthier, fuller lives. And we have a customer pledge, and we have a week every year where we sort of celebrate our commitment to our customers, and no matter who you vote for, no matter what culture you represent, we have a common purpose and a common commitment.”

A new issue, says Glasgow is that“suddenly, with AI, every employee is a communicator. They can make content. They can make videos. They can do all kinds of things, which is exciting and great and wonderful. And also the scariest thing in the world because you just have an army of communications, people that are self-anointed and out telling stories.

“And so we are leading conversations about the governance issues, what are the restrictions, what are the things that we can do to better enable people to make content that that is great, that is on brand, that does talk like our company talks. And so how do you sort of harness all of that very real energy and very real passion for people wanting to share our story.”

With that, Boyden brings the conversation around to one of the big issues for corporate affairs executives in the current environment, reputation resilience-and the ways corporate brand can enhance resilience.

Brotz recalls her earlier comments on the connections between corporate and product brand and says,“You can't really dissociate a product brand from your corporate brand. If you pay attention to any reputation survey, the quality of your products and services is always the most important factor in your reputation. So if you have a problem with a product that's your compact, I think, with your customers and with society, and so you have to take every action to resolve that.”

She points to the challenges Samsung faced during its battery crisis three years ago.“They took a massive financial hit to resolve that issue. They didn't hide it, they didn't try to spin it. They just went out there and fixed it, and the next version right was the bestselling phone in the world.

“So I think as a communicator, your number one job is to preserve your company's freedom to operate, and that means you have to maintain trust above all else.”

Preparation is a major part of that, Cabrera says.“So much of the job of communications, I think, is playing chess not checkers, trying to think several moves out. And I think when it comes to the corporate brands you have to get ready for that crisis before it hits. Because I think that the tension that comes is when that crisis does hit, you have to acknowledge that you're going to get very tempted to just respond to the crisis, and you will lose sight of the corporate brand.

“The value of running these exercises ahead of time is that you can begin to have some perspective before you lose it.”

“Nobody makes good decisions under crisis ever in the history of the world,” Glasgow agrees.“At Logitech and previously at HP, we have a one page bible of the potential-not all, let's be clear, but a somewhat exhaustive list-things that could come up, and their relevance to our corporate brand, whether or not those are things that we would weigh in on.”

Scenario planning, she says,“takes some of the emotion out of a crisis when you've agreed on something, when things are calm and clear, and you can go back and say, I have a chart that says we're not going to do that. When CEOs are getting phone calls and stock prices are dropping, it's hard to make good decisions when that's happening.”

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