Strategic Issues Management explores the strategic planning options that organizations can employ to address crucial public policy issues, engage in collaborative decision making, get the organization′s ‘house’ in order, engage in tough defense and smart offense, and monitor opinion changes that affect public policy. In this fully updated Second Edition, authors Robert L. Heath and Michael J. Palenchar offer practical, actionable guidance that readers can apply to organizations from large Fortune 500 companies to nongovernmental organizations and start-up high tech companies.
Features
- Includes a NEW chapter on brand equity, updated examples, theories and cases throughout, new information on activists and activism, and increased attention to the role that technology plays in issues management
- Explores ways public relations, risk communication, and crisis communication can be used to address crucial public policy options
- Advises managers on ways to lessen the chance of a crisis becoming an issue through an examination of crisis preparation and responses
- Addresses the topic of reputation management by exploring the connection between issues management and brand equity using examples from Mc Donald′s and Wal-Mart
- Challenges managers to engage in collaborative decision making with community leaders and residents to reduce the chance that undue fear will translate into unnecessary regulation or legislation
- Opens each chapter with case study vignettes and closes with summary questions and issues management challenges
Strategic Issues Management is appropriate for courses in Corporate/Strategic Communications, Public Relations Management, Crisis/Risk Communication, Strategic Management, Public Relations Management, Organizational Communication, and Public Policy and Administration.
Cuprins
1. A Foundation of Community
Vignette: British Petroleum–Enlightened Leader or Lightning Rod?
Chapter Goals
Historical Evolution
SIM: Strategic Issues Management Defined
SIM: Stakeholders/Stakeseekers
SIM: Bringing More Than Communication
SIM: Cornerstone of Strategic Business Planning
SIM: Advocacy, Dialogue, and Collaborative Decision Making
Conclusion
SIM Challenge: CSR and Long-Term Planning
Summary Questions
2. Historical Foundations
Vignette: Westinghouse Versus Edison
Chapter Goals
Opinions Shape Operating Environments
Argument Structure in Public Policy Debate
Robber Barons and the Making of Mass Production Society
The Great Depression and the Redemption of Capitalism
Dissent Flowers in the 1960s
The Present and the Future
Conclusion
SIM Challenge: Science or Sham?
Summary Questions
3. Scouting the Terrain
Vignette: The Greening of Nuclear Power
Chapter Goals
Things Go Bump in the Dark
Logics of Issues Monitoring
The Systematic Stages of Issues Monitoring
Creating an Issues Monitoring and Analysis Team
Issue Content: Basis for Issues Analysis
Conclusion
SIM Challenge: NAACP and Issues Monitoring
Summary Questions
4. Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)
Vignette: Wal-Mart’s Makeover?
Chapter Goals
Mutual Interests: The Basis of Corporate Responsibility
Standards of Corporate Responsibility: A Rhetorical Rationale
Changing Organizational Policies: Getting the House in Order
Corporate Responsibility Partnerships: Communicating Ethical Performance
Conclusion
SIM Challenge: Global Warming
Summary Questions
5. Special Interest Activists as Foes or Allies
Vignette: Fast Food–A Lightning Rod for Big Food Protest
Chapter Goals
Moral Outrage
Power Resource Management
Strain: Nexus of Issues, Risk, and Crisis
Stages of Activism
Incremental Erosion
Fostering Mutual Interests Instead of Antagonism
Conclusion
SIM Challenge: Is Clean Energy an Oxymoron?
Summary Questions
6. Issues Communication
Vignettes: Activists Speak With Many Tools
Chapter Goals
The Issue of Issues Communication
Narrative Theory
The Good Organization Communicating Well
Images and Issues: Complements and Counterparts
Framing: Giving Issues Argumentative Context
Media Effects in a Multitiered Society
Communication Technology and Issues Communication
Issues Communication as Argument
Conclusion
SIM Challenge: Voice of a Trade Association
Summary Questions
7. Obligations and Constraints on Issues Communication
Vignette: Corporate Speech–Free, Free for Some, or Not at All?
Chapter Goals
Legislative, Judicial, and Regulatory Constraints on Issues Communication
The Rationale for Organizations Speaking as Citizens
Federal Constraint
Conclusion
SIM Challenge: Looking to the Future
Summary Questions
8. Issues Management and Crisis Communication
Vignette: It Takes Two to Tango
Chapter Goals
Crisis Management: The Search for Control
Prevent a Crisis From Becoming an Issue
Conclusion
SIM Challenge: Can a Crisis Be Prevented From Exploding Into an Issue?
Summary Questions
9. Issues Management and Risk Communication
Vignette: Risk, Risk Everywhere
Chapter Goals
Community Right to Know
The Difficulties of Risk Assessment
Risk Management and Communication Approaches
SIM′s Approach to Risk Communication
Risk and Crisis Communication Working Together
Conclusion
SIM Challenge: Reality List
Summary Questions
10. Brand Equity and Organizational Reputation
Vignettes: Proactive Versus Reactive
Chapter Goals
Corporate Branding
Brand Equity: Many Faces and Definitions
Brand Attributes and Attitude Theory
Logics of Brand Equity
Brand Equity and Crisis
Brand Equity and Risk
SIM Challenge: Corporate Responsibility and Long-Term Planning
A Brand Equity Case Study: Coors Boycott in the 1970s
Summary Questions
Despre autor
Michael J. Palenchar is an assistant professor in public relations at The University of Tennessee’s School of Advertising and Public Relations, College of Communication and Information (Ph. D., University of Florida; M.A., University of Houston). Research interests include risk communication and issues management related to manufacturing, community relations and community awareness of emergency response protocols and manufacturing risks, community right to know issues, crisis communication, front groups and general public relations. He has more than a decade of professional experience working in corporate, non-profit and agency, as well as a risk communication and issues management research consultant for clients ranging from Fortune 500 companies to local government agencies to nongovernmental agencies. His research has been published in the Journal of Public Relations Research, Public Relations Review, Public Relations Journal, Environmental Communication and Communication Research Reports. He has five book chapters on risk, terrorism and professional ethics and more than 40 regional, national or international communication conference papers, winning 12 national or international top paper awards. With co-author Robert L. Heath in 2000 and Kathy Fitzpatrick in 2007, he won the Pride Award from the Public Relations Division, National Communication Association, for top published article in the field of public relations. He is an active member of AEJMC, NCA, PRSA, and ICA.