A reputation assessment of orange river cellars using the reputation quotient®

Abstract

Having a good corporate reputation is exceedingly advantageous. However, organisations’ corporate reputations are under severe pressure today, because they are under the constant scrutiny of a variety of stakeholders. A corporate reputation comprises the overall perceptions that stakeholders acquire of an organisation over time; thus, organisations should know how stakeholders perceive them. In this study, corporate reputation management and measurement were investigated, in particular the value of performing annual reputation assessments, understanding stakeholders’ views and implementing strategies accordingly. By managing and measuring corporate reputation, organisations can identify how they are perceived by stakeholders and enhance their corporate reputations by rectifying their past failures and shortcomings. The focus of this study was Orange River Cellars, a wine-producing organisation that had been in the industry for more than 50 years. Its corporate reputation management history was undetermined, because its management team had never conducted a reputation measurement assessment. Therefore, it was likely that the organisation’s corporate reputation might not be strategically managed. In light of this objective, the primary research question that guided the study was to determine the various stakeholders and management’s perceptions of the overall corporate reputation of Orange River Cellars. A literature review was conducted to explore various components of corporate reputation and related topics, including corporate communication, corporate reputation management and corporate reputation measurement. The literature study was also utilised to establish the history of global wine, South African wine and the background of Orange River Cellars. To determine Orange River Cellars’ stakeholders and management’s perceptions of the organisation’s corporate reputation, a mixed-methods research design, with both qualitative and quantitative methods, was utilised. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12 members of Orange River Cellars’ management and an online e-mail survey was sent to all the relevant stakeholders. The Harris-Fombrun and Van Riel’s Reputation Quotient® (2007) measurement instrument was utilised for the survey, together with constructs from the corporate reputation literature. The results of the interviews indicated that Orange Rivers Cellars’ management team had knowledge of corporate reputation management and measurement but had not executed a corporate reputation assessment for the organisation. The results of the survey revealed that the stakeholders respected Orange River Cellars, but that the organisation could improve on the results of the vision and leadership, and financial performance dimensions of the Reputation Quotient®. This study provides insight into Orange River Cellars’ current corporate reputation and could aid the organisation to implement future strategic decisions based on the feedback from the stakeholders. It also serves as a guide for Orange River Cellars in terms of measuring and managing its corporate reputation effectively to develop new strategies to compare its image to those of competitors. The study also demonstrates the importance of attaining a strong corporate reputation.