atkinson advisor

The latest Corporate Reputation Rankings index isn’t good news for Corporate America.

Negativity abounds in the public mindset when it comes to large corporations, according to the findings from Vision Critical and its public affairs arm, Angus Reid Public Opinion.

Consumer goods companies, like Johnson & Johnson (No. 1) and Kraft Foods (No. 2), computing companies, and technology firms dominated the top 10. What separated these from the financial services and health insurance companies on the bottom of the list?

• They weren’t perceived as behaving like greedy “idiots” (their words, not ours). Respondents recognized that these companies generate good returns for shareholders, but they also admired them for being good corporate citizens.
• They managed to avoid any major recent scandals. It’s no surprise that almost half of Americans hold very negative opinions of BP, in large part to the oil spill in the Gulf.
• They are well-known brands. Not only do they have great name recognition, but they also are seen as valuable household guests. Consumers trust these brands and rank them high in quality.

One of the researchers who worked on the study predicted the trend toward negativity will continue if companies don’t start communicating better about why they should be respected.

YOUR TURN: How do you build trust with your core audiences?

Wall Street has had a bad year on every front. And nearly everyone has suffered.

Right or wrong, the federal government stepped in to shore up the industry and save thousands of jobs.

It’s time for Wall Street to show their thanks to American taxpayers by not paying year-end bonuses. It’s the right thing to do now to show that they are committed to fixing the problems they helped cause.

Wall Street executives cry that they will lose talent. And how is that a bad thing? Are these not the same people who caused the problem in the first place? With more than 100,000 job losses, it’s also a buyer’s market in Manhattan.

The American people have a crisis of confidence in our financial system. The only way to restore that confidence is with leadership and sacrifice.

http://www.glassdoor.com/

You might know how satisfied employees are with your company, but now everyone else — including competitors and recruits — can get a sneak peek. At Glassdoor.com, disgruntled and content employees write reviews about their companies, rate their CEOs, and score their overall satisfaction. Everyone who writes an anonymous review has full access to more than 14,000 companies’ posts for free. Reviews are broken down into pros, cons, and advice to senior management. Potential employees can also see salary ranges for companies by job description if they post the salary for their current position.

Two recent natural disasters in Asia have shone spotlights on a country that is slowly loosening some media restrictions and another that still doesn’t get it.

After a May 12 earthquake killed more than 12,000 people in the Sichuan province, the Chinese government barred reporters from entering the disaster zone. Some media ignored the command and reported on the tragedy anyway. Instead of reacting harshly, China’s Propaganda Department (an ironic name) softened its stance and asked reporters to accompany rescue teams. The Chinese government’s official news agency, Xinhua, even provided regular updates on death tolls.

Contract that with Myanmar’s junta regime. After Cyclone Nargis swept through in early May, it denied access to reporters and, even worse, aid workers. When the government finally started to release death tolls, they reported much fewer than the 100,000 U.S. officials predicted, wiping away any credibility state media may have had.

Now the rest of the world is largely sympathetic to China’s plight but critical of Myanmar’s secrecy and controlling policies. The world notices when a country doesn’t seem to care about its people or reputation.

Warren Buffett once said, “If you lose dollars for the firm, I’ll be understanding. If you lose reputation for the firm, I’ll be ruthless.”

Nothing can damage the reputation of a firm more quickly than handling a crisis poorly. Scan through the five questions below and note whether you would answer “yes” to key drivers of effective crisis management.

Although these five questions are not a comprehensive audit of your preparedness, they will give you an initial assessment. If you answered yes to all of these statements, your company is probably in good shape. If you answered yes to four, you have done some work but have room for improvement. Three or fewer, you have risks you need to address quickly.

TJX, the parent company of TJ Maxx, revealed in its most recent SEC filing that hackers may have stolen more than 40 million credit card numbers of customers.

Bad things happen to good companies. At the same time, they cannot hide behind the bad news.

The company learned about the security breach last December and promptly began working with law enforcement. It disclosed the breach when law enforcement officials said doing so would not jeopardize the investigation. This was the right course of action.

The latest disclosure, however, is disturbing.

Mistake No. 1: An SEC filing is no way to share bad news with customers, especially something as personal and worrisome as identify theft.

Mistake No. 2: The complete absence of the CEO Carol Meyrowitz. She should be meeting with reporters to apologize to customers for the error, explain the next steps, and tell customers how they can get help. So far, that doesn’t seem to be the case.

Security analysts estimate the breach could cost TJX $1.5 billion to fix. The loss of goodwill will be infinitely larger for every day the company buries its head in the sand.