Building BP's Reputation: Tooting Your Own Horn 2001-2002

Public Relations Quarterly, Winter 2004 by Healy, Robert, Griffin, Jennifer J

Corporate reputation: why is it important? How is a reputation created? What is a corporate reputation or a corporate political reputation anyway? And, why might public relations executives care about corporate reputation? Fombrun (1996) suggests that "a corporate reputation is the perceptual representation of a company's past actions and future prospects that describe the firm's overall appeal to all of its key constituents when compared to other leading rivals." It is what the public (either differentiated or at large) thinks of the corporation (Dowling, 2001). A corporate reputation is an integral part of a corporation's nonmarket or contextual environment (Baron, 1995; Van De Heijden, 2001; Mahon, 2002; Boddewyn, 2003).

Public relations executives are continually challenged with developing, defending and enhancing a firm's reputation - especially during times of restructuring (Dentchev and Heene, 2004). Moving corporate reputation from an externally directed marketing tool to a strategic asset entails aligning external and internal expressions (Schultz and de Chernatony, 2002; Preece, Fleisher, and Toccacelli, 1995). At the nexus of intertwining external and internal expressions, public relations executives are a window out of the organization through which management can perceive, monitor and understand external changes. At the same time, public relations executives are a window in to the organization to build credibility, transparency and trust in corporate policies (Post, Murray, Dickie, and Mahon, 1983; Adams, 1976). The dual acting window out/window in nature of public relations executives represents the challenges of managing public perceptions and creating internal accountability inherent in corporate reputations. Deploying consistent, coherent strategies to build credible corporate reputations are a key challenge for public relations executives, on a daily basis.

Corporate reputations are tangible assets that help shape a company's impact in the market place. Solid reputations can produce immense goodwill, translating, into increased share prices, ability to entice employees, consumers and investors; command higher product prices; and reduce potential for corporate crises (Fombrun, 1996; Manon and Wartick, 2003; Vergin, 1998). At the same time, a solid corporate reputation can assist a company's standing among policy actors (Manon and Wartick, 2003). Simply put, an enhanced political standing can provide (a) an extra psychological value when soliciting stakeholders for assistance; (b) help politicians choose among competitors who want different variations of the same outcome; (c) send powerful signals to politicians who want to do the company harm; (d) allow easier access to policymakers compared to the access granted to companies with less than stellar reputations; (e) get the benefit of the doubt when the corporation is faced with adversity; and, (f) create a reservoir of goodwill to draw upon (Watkins, Edwards, and Thakrar, 2001; Gale and Buchholz, 1987).

Being recognized for a solid corporation reputation is a strategic objective of most large corporations. Almost all companies are aware that aside from politicians, investors, employees, potential employees, and customers, high-end business publications such as The Wall Street Journal or Financial Times are intensely interested in corporate reputations. Every year, Fortune asks managers, analysts and other 'influentials' to rate corporations on a number of indices; from that rating, Fortune publishes an extensive list - of the 'Best Companies to Work For', 'the Best CEOs', 'the Best Companies within an Industry Group', etc. Fortune surveys and others such as Business Week and Forbes try to approximate important elements of a reputation.2

While having a good reputation accrues benefits, building and maintaining a solid reputation is not necessarily intuitive, obvious nor serendipitous (Kosnik, 1991). BP's goal was to mold, or remold, its corporate reputation with particular attention to the standing of the company and strengthening its legitimacy in the United States (Meznar and Nigh, 1993). We examine the genesis of the corporate change, message construction, message deployment, accountability, results and demise of reputation building process in 2001-2002. Surprisingly, breakthrough thinking, forward planning and dogged implementation produced significant results only to have the process abruptly eliminated, a victim of internal corporate politics.

The Corporate Change

BP - an amalgamation of British Petroleum, Amoco, ARCO, and Burmah Castrol - is hardly the exception to the notion that corporations actively attempt to manage corporate and political reputation. For BP, by middle 2001, ample reason existed for a concerted focus on reputation. One reason can be traced to Group Chief Executive Lord John Browne.3

Browne became executive leader of then British Petroleum in 1995, following a stellar and flawless career climbing the corporate ladder (Kellerman, 1999). On the way up - and intensifying with his elevation to Group Chief Executive, Browne set out to burnish, create, and sustain an image of himself as a 'different kind of oil executive leading a different kind of oil company' - one who managed the daily assets as well as propel British Petroleum as a major player in the international oil market. Over the next few years, Lord Browne engineered a take over of Amoco, ARCO, Burmah Castrol; expanded British Petroleum's reach into a truly global company; changed the name of the company; and, spoke forcefully and eloquently on world issues such as global climate change and governmental corruption. Lord Browne's image as a progressive industry thinker began to pay dividends for BP stockholders. Employees and investors spoke of a "Browne" stock price premium (Berry and Cartwright, 2000).