Practitioner perceptions of corporate reputation: an empirical investigation

Owner‐managers or managing directors of 106 UK public relations consultancies completed a questionnaire concerning the extent of their firms’ client reputation management activities and their attitudes and opinions about reputational work. The results suggested widespread interest in the concept and practice of reputation management as an area of activity separate and distinct from other aspects of PR. However, respondents expressed concerns about the existence of barriers to the implementation of reputation management programmes within client companies. The executives most likely to agree with the “academic” definition of corporate reputation were those whose consultancies offered a large number of reputation management services; who believed that the demand for these services was about to rise; and who clearly distinguished between reputational and general PR activities. Only a small percentage of the sample disagreed with the proposition that most innovations in the field of reputation management were attributable to practitioners rather than academics.