CorporateIdentity_1997 (1).pdf

Corporate identity: the

concept, its measurement and

management

Cees B.M. van Riel

Graduate School of Management, Erasmus University, Rotterdam,

The Netherlands, and

John M.T. Balmer

Department of Marketing, University of Strathclyde Business School,

Glasgow, UK

European

Journal

of Marketing

31,5/6

340

Corporate identity: clarifying the concept

There are divergent views within the literature as to what is meant by corporate

identity. In this article the authors refer to three main developments in the area

which variously equate corporate identity with graphic design, with integrated

corporate communication and last, with a multidisciplinary approach which

draws heavily on organizational behaviour. Each of the three approaches has

tended to follow a separate line of development and it would appear that the

literature on each of the three strands has started to reach maturity.

Increasingly, writers are drawing on several of these strands and this has led to

a multidisciplinary approach. The characteristics of each of the three

aforementioned strands will be discussed in the next section.

Corporate identity: the graphic design paradigm

Originally, corporate identity was synonymous with organizational

nomenclature, logos, company housestyle and visual identification. Many

corporate identity practitioners had (and have) their roots in graphic design and

understandably a good deal of importance was assigned to graphic design. The

authors contend that graphic designers have been hugely influential in two

regards, in that they articulated the basic tenets of corporate identity formation

and management and succeeded in keeping the subject on the agenda of senior

managers. Of note are North American practitioners who were the first to create

managerial interest in the area and include Selame and Selame (1975), Margulies

(1977), Carter (1982) and Chajet (1992). They were followed by UK design and

communications consultants such as Olins (1978, 1989), Bernstein (1986),

Jackson (1987), Ind (1990) and Pilditch (1970) and then by German (Birkight and

Stadler, 1980), Dutch (Blauw, 1989) and French (Hebert 1987) practitioners.

The role of symbolism is now assigned a greater role and has grown from its

original purpose of increasing organizational visibility to a position where it is

seen as having a role in communicating corporate strategy. Notable with regard to

the latter is Olins (1978) who classified visual identity into three main types

European Journal of Marketing,

Vol. 31 No. 5/6, 1997, pp. 340-355.

(monolithic, endorsed and branded) which he observed was used by organizations

to reflect an organization’s strategy, branding and communications policies.

Corporate

identity

Corporate identity: the integrated communication paradigm

The realization by graphic designers and marketers of the efficacy of

consistency in visual and marketing communications led to a number of

authors arguing that there should be consistency in formal corporate

communication (Bernstein, 1986; Schultz, Tannenbaum and Lauterborn, 1994).

The breadth, complexity, and importance of corporate communications was

pointed out by Bernstein who argued that organizations should communicate

effectively with all of their stakeholders. Implicit in Bernstein’s (1986)

comments, and those made more recently by Grunig (1992), is that the

corporate communication mix and its management is fundamentally different

from and is more complicated than, the marketing communications mix.

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Corporate identity: the interdisciplinary paradigm (marshalling the corporate

identity mix)

Starting with Olins (1978) and followed by Birkight and Stadler (1980) the

understanding of corporate identity has gradually broadened and is now taken

to indicate the way in which an organization’s identity is revealed through

behaviour, communications, as well as through symbolism to internal and

external audiences. Both academics and consultants have realized that defining

identity can be problematic and as such the recently formed International

Corporate Identity Group (ICIG) whose steering committee includes academics

from Strathclyde, Erasmus and Harvard Business Schools, together with leading

consultants, have decided not to give a definition of corporate identity but rather

a statement which articulates the multidisciplinary nature of the area and its

difference from brand management. The so called “Strathclyde Statement” will

be found in the Appendix.

In recent years academics have produced important work on the area such as

Abratt (1989), Albert and Whetten (1985), Balmer (1994, 1995), Larçon and

Rietter (1979), Ramanantsoa (1989), van Rekom (1993), van Riel (1992, 1995) and

Wiedmann (1988). Increasingly academics acknowledge that a corporate

identity refers to an organization’s unique characteristics which are rooted in

the behaviour of members of the organization. Many of the above scholars

conclude that the management of an organization’s identity is of strategic

importance and requires a multidisciplinary approach. They argue that senior

managers can narrow the gap between the actual and desired corporate identity

through marshalling the corporate identity mix (communications, symbolism

and behaviour).

Corporate identity management (CIM)

The rationale for CIM

The objective of CIM is to establish a favourable reputation with an organization’s

stakeholders which it is hoped will be translated by such stakeholders into a

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Journal

of Marketing

31,5/6

propensity to buy that organization’s products and services, to work for or to

invest in the organization (Balmer, 1995; van Riel, 1995). There is evidence to

support the notion that a favourable corporate reputation gives an organization a

competitive advantage (Beatty and Ritter, 1986; Caves and Porter, 1977; Fombrun

and Shanley, 1990; Greyser, 1996; Klein and Leffler, 1981; Maathuis, 1993;

Milgrom and Roberts, 1986; Stigler, 1962; Wilson, 1985 and Worcester, 1986).

The literature on corporate identity sees corporate identity management as

taking into account an organization’s historical roots (Ramanantsoa, 1989) its

personality (Balmer, 1995; Birkight and Stadler, 1980; Olins, 1978), its corporate

strategy (Wiedmann, 1988) and the three parts of the corporate identity mix

(behaviour of organizational members, communication and symbolism) in order

to acquire a favourable corporate reputation (Fombrun 1996) which results in

improved organizational performance (Fombrun and Shanley, 1989; Wang,

1994). Reputation and performance are also influenced by developments in the

external environment such as changes in the behaviour of competitors, as well

as by corporate stakeholders such as customers, personnel and government.

Schematically, this is shown in Figure 1.

342

CI-mix

Organizational

performance

• financial

performance

• sales

• environment

• HRM

• etc

Behaviour

Culture

history

Corporate

strategy

Corporate

reputation

Communications

Figure 1.

Interaction between

corporate identity

formation, reputation,

improvement and

organizational

performance

Symbolism

Environment

Source: van Reil Balmer (nd)

Methods used to reveal the actual corporate identity

Determining the actual corporate identity

During the last decade, several methods have been developed which have the

objective of revealing an organization’s actual corporate identity. Many of the

available methods come from “traditional” consumer behaviour research, which

draws on survey techniques in order to ascertain an organization’s external

image (Gray, 1985; Poiesz, 1988). Such methods have been adopted for use

within organizations (De Cock, 1984 and Keller, 1990). Other methods have also

been advocated including the use of semi-structured interviews (Bernstein,

1986; Lux, 1986), ethnography (Balmer, 1996) and heuristic analyses of

historical sources (Ramanantsoa, 1989).

A popular method used by design consultancies and others is the visual audit

which has the objective of revealing some of the basic traits of an organization’s

identity (Napoles, 1988; Olins, 1989) by interpreting organizational symbolism.

More academic in character is heuristic analysis which examines an

organization’s historical roots and looks for areas of conflict within the

organization (Ramanantsoa, 1989). Balmer’s (1996) affinity audit (BAA) is a

specialized method using the principles of ethnography. This requires wide

access within an organization and combines a number of qualitative methods of

data collection such as semi-structured interviews, observation and an

examination of documentary evidence. There is also the laddering technique

which relies on means-end interviews resulting in Hierarchical Value Maps

(van Rekom, 1994) and the Rotterdam Organizational Identification Test

(ROIT) (van Riel, Smidts and Pruyn, 1994) which reveals the degree of

acceptance by personnel of the desired corporate identity as articulated by

senior managers.

The following section provides an explanation of three of the above methods:

the laddering technique, Balmer’s affinity audit (BAA) and the Rotterdam

Organizational Identification Test (ROIT).

Corporate

identity

343

Laddering technique

The laddering technique was originally developed to determine the image of

products and brands. It is based on the central notion of the means-end theory, as

developed by Reynolds and Gutman (1988), which explains human behaviour as

a series of “meant-end” actions. People act purposely “applying means” to

achieve “ends” such as earning money, getting external respect, etc. Ends are

classified hierarchically from abstract attributes to functional consequences. The

values which are important to employees are ascertained by asking the question

“What is important to you?” The question is repeated until a chain of meanings

is built up which leads through levels of increasing abstraction from the concrete

attribute, via its consequences, to the underlying values. Van Rekom (1993)

transformed the technique to the area of corporate identity. The laddering

method (Van Rekom, 1993) is useful in that it helps to explain what is important

to employees. The method includes open interviews whereby employees are

asked to describe what they do (i.e. their job description), how they do it (i.e. their

work activities), why they work in this way (i.e. behaviour) and why they

consider this type of behaviour to be important.

The objective of this is to describe the behaviour of personnel and to reveal

important insights with regards to the dominant values of individual

employees. In their aggregate, the values of personnel give important insights

into an organization’s identity.

Balmer’s affinity audit (BAA)

This method has the objective of explaining the driving forces which sustain an

organization’s corporate identity. Balmer’s (1996) audit grew out of his research

on the identity of BBC Scotland. His methodology used the principles of

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of Marketing

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grounded theory (Glaser and Strauss, 1967). This resulted in the hypothesis that

corporate identity formation is grounded in a basic social psychological process

(BSPP) based on affinity. The research showed that the basic social

psychological process (bspp) underpinning corporate identity was complex and

multilayered in that personnel had an affinity with a range of values and beliefs.

These values and beliefs take many different forms including those of the

organization’s founder, those of the holding organization, those of the subsidiary

and business units, those of a professional class and those of an external culture.

Balmer is of the view that the composite of values and beliefs forms the

corporate personality which he sees as a key determinant of an organization’s

corporate identity.

Balmer’s affinity audit (BAA) requires the researcher to gain wide access

within the organization in order to reveal the dominant systems of values and

beliefs. Researching the system of values and beliefs is achieved by referring to

the everyday language, ideologies, rituals and beliefs of personnel (Pettigrew

1979). As such, the researcher relies on a variety of methods of data collection,

i.e. semi-structured interviews, observation and an examination of

organizational documentation. In analysing the data the coding process

advocated by Glaser and Strauss (1967) is used. Figure 2 illustrates the basic

steps involved in the audit.

The BAA involves a basic four stage process:

(1) establish the corporate mission and strategy;

(2) reveal the dominant systems of values and beliefs within the

organization;

(3) evaluate such systems of values and beliefs against the corporate

mission and strategy; and

(4) nurture those values and beliefs which support the corporate mission

and strategy.

The audit has certain similarities with the type of research undertaken by

classic corporate identity consultants in that it requires first, wide access to the

organization under study and second, relies exclusively on qualitative methods

of data collection. The advantage of the audit is that it reveals the organization’s

corporate personality: this being a prerequisite to an understanding of the

organization’s identity. This has been pointed out several times over the last 15

years by Olins (1978, 1995) who explained that the tangible manifestation of a

corporate personality is its corporate identity.

Balmer is of the view that it might be possible to develop a similar audit

which is undertaken among an organization’s external stakeholders. The

results of such an audit may be of use in determining the branding structure to

be adopted (parent visibility) in devising corporate communication strategies

and even whether or not there needs to be a change in corporate mission and

strategy. Figure 3 is a conceptual model based on the above.

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