Page 19 - Corporate Communication

Cornelissen-01.qxd 10/11/2004 4:03 PM Page 10

10 Mapping the Field

because corporate communications is essentially a management function that is used
by companies in a strategic and instrumental manner.As the book will outline, com-
panies need to be judged as ‘legitimate’ by most, if not all, of their stakeholders in
order to survive and prosper, and corporate communications is the management
function that works the hardest to achieve that.

Understanding corporate communications
As a result of the greater importance that is now attributed to corporate communi-
cations in the world of management, the numbers of professionals working in the
area, and equally the numbers of university courses and professional training pro-
grammes that cater for their development, have mushroomed in recent years. Even
Master of Business Administration (MBA) students, who in the past have been reluc-
tant to follow business communications and corporate communications courses, are
now in the wake of the corporate scandals and economic turmoil in the US calling
for taught modules on corporate communications and corporate social responsibil-
1
ity. Of course, communications practitioners need to know how to recognize, diag-
nose and solve communication-related management problems, but more and more
it appears that the need for understanding corporate communications spirals to other
management areas, including senior management and the Chief Executive Officer
(CEO). It is indeed useful for managers of all ranks to know what the corporate
communications function entails; what it can do for their business; and also how
conditions can be created in which communications practitioners can work to the
best effect.
Understanding corporate communications management has, however, advantages
above and beyond corporate success and career advancement. In many companies,
the role and contribution of corporate communications is far from being fully
understood. In such companies, communications practitioners feel undervalued,
their strategic input into decision making is compromised, and senior managers and
CEOs feel powerless because they simply do not understand the events that are tak-
ing place in the company’s environment and how these events may affect the com-
pany’s operations and profits. Communications practitioners and senior managers
therefore need to be able to take a critical perspective on corporate communications;
that is, they need to be able to recognize and diagnose communication-related man-
agement problems, and have an understanding of appropriate strategies and courses
of action for dealing with these. Such an understanding (and the learning and appli-
cation in practice that it triggers) is not only essential to an effective functioning of
the corporate communications function, but also is in itself empowering – it allows
communications practitioners and managers to understand and take charge of events
that fall within the remit of corporate communications; to determine which events
are outside their control; how communications practitioners can contribute to other
functional areas within the company; and discover new strategies that the company
could have used successfully and will be able to use in the future.
The primary goal of this book is to give readers a sense of how corporate com-
munications is used and managed strategically; and how professional and organiza-
tional conditions are created that facilitate and support communications practitioners