Identity, Image, and Reputation

You Are What I Think You Are

Identity, image, and reputation are incredibly important aspects of communication in general, but even more so in organizational communication. What your internal and external constituents' opinions and views of you are are vital to your organization's survival. Ultimately, it isn't what you think about your corporation that is important; it is what everybody else thinks about your company that makes the difference.

Identity is the most controllable portion of that almost holy trinity for an organization. Image and reputation are almost entirely the manifestations of a person's (organization's) constituents. This makes having an effective and positive identity a priority to remain in the public's good favor. This necessitates the importance of having effective company names and logos that are congruent with the image an organization wants their constituents to have in mind when they think of them.

Take it Step By Step

When an organization is seeking manage their identity, a series of steps should be taken to achieve the most desirable outcome. Through a series of very deliberate actions like conducting an identity audit, outlining objectives, and developing and testing prototypes, a positive identity can be created. However, just following the steps isn't enough to make it effective. Constituents have opinions about an organization before they even have a one-on-one experience with it. As such, once the interaction actually takes place, it is extremely important to make sure that the experience is a positive one.

A Reputation Makes You...Not the Other Way Around

When it comes down to it, the an organization's reputation is totally out of that group's control. Whether it is accurate or not, the formation of a reputation rests squarely with their constituents. Because of that, an organization must take as many proactive steps as possible and necessary to assure their constituents have the same view of the organization that the organization has of itself.

In my own experience, I helped to try to change the image of the athletic department at the University of Pittsburgh at Greensburg. I helped to distribute fliers and letters about the athletic department's identity to students, faculty, and staff at the school to try to change the fact that the sports teams often went ignored by the general population of the campus. Other members of the athletic department helped to make athletic department's website more user-friendly, dynamic, and interesting. Overall, the efforts that were put forth made some strides toward changing perceptions within the campus community paid off. Though the initial results were minimal, the positive effects of everybody's efforts are now being shown with the reputation the school and the athletic program being more positive among the campus community and within the AMCC conference as well.