The Chief Executive Officer, communication and reputation: What competencies are required?

Organisational messages influence core stakeholders (investors, analysts, media, suppliers, customers, governments and communities) and the Chief Executive Officer has the primary role in developing the messages needed to build and foster organisational reputations with these key stakeholders. Kitchen and Laurence (2003:116) argue that the reputation of the CEO and corporate reputation are 'increasingly intertwined'. CEOs therefore must be as competent in communicating with key stakeholders in the same way they are in their stewardship and management of finance, marketing, production, marketing and personnel matters. The research to date however, does not state what communication competencies a CEO requires to manage this vital task. Communication appears to be a 'given' in management texts, is rarely taught in business schools, and it is only public relations/corporate affairs practitioners who understand the central role of communication in ensuring a two-way dialogue between the CEO and core stakeholders.There is a substantial gap in the management and communication literature on the high level communication attributes required by CEOs to manage reputation relationships with core stakeholders. This paper reviews the literature on CEO communication and reputation and proposes a conceptual framework for assessing which CEO communication attributes would contribute to reputation building.