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Administration May 6, 2002
Reputations Ruined by Unethical Conduct
June 5, 2002 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - Having witnessed
the fallout from the Arthur Andersen accounting scandal,
almost half the executives polled in a survey cited unethical
behavior as one of the greatest threats to a company's
reputation.
Reported by Camilla Klein
And watching the scandal unfold in the media caused 49% of the sample to cite negative press as constituting a real threat.
According to the annual Corporate Reputation Watch survey by Chief Executive magazine and PR firm Hill and Knowlton,
- a further 36% believe that disasters pose the most danger to corporate reputation,
- some 35% point to litigation, and
- only 13% of the sample say that criticism on the Internet poses the biggest threat
Influences
This year’s survey found that
- 93% of the nation’s senior executives believe that the opinion of customers strongly influences corporate reputation,
- followed by employees, cited by 80%, and
- CEO reputation, also 80%
The majority of the companies included in the survey measure their corporate reputation either formally or informally. To do so,
- 73% listen to the word on the street,
- 41% conduct custom research,
- 40% believe that financial performance has the most impact on corporate reputation,
- 32% pay attention to media coverage, and
- 27% take note of published rankings.
The survey, which was conducted by Harris Interactive in February, comprised the input of 557 executives.