The aim of the research conducted in To Reach Everyone – The Regional Councils’ Communication to Foreign-Born During the COVID-19 Pandemic is to explore how communications officers on Swedish regional councils have thought and resonated about the strategies used to reach foreign-born during the COVID-19 pandemic. Discourse psychology is the main theoretical framework and is combined with a late modern view on crisis communication and the Discourse of Renewal Theory. The study can be placed in the field of strategic communication. The material consists of qualitative semi-structured interviews with six communications officers from different regional councils. The interviews were conducted in the spring of 2021. The results show that all of the six regional councils have taken foreign-born into consideration in their communication. Furthermore, six interpretative repertoires were identified: responsibility, resources, cooperation, wide selection of channels, constantly changing information and learning. The communications officers feel a huge responsibility to reach the entire population, however, often lack the resources needed. The main strategies to reach foreign-born has been cooperation with other actors and using a wide selection of channels in the communication efforts. The communications officers have been challenged by the constantly changing information and use their experiences for learning for future situations.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / Creating a culture of health within an organization offers benefits such as reducing costs and supporting employees in becoming and staying healthy. A variety of health and wellness programs within an organization are important for establishing a culture of health. These programs are supported communicatively to encourage employee participation and healthful behavior changes. Recognized for their success in creating a culture of health, a group of organizations, distinguished as 5-Star AchieveWELL organizations, offer an opportunity to identify messaging strategies effective at promoting health and wellness within the workplace and therefore, creating a culture of health. The goals of this study included learning successful organization’s communication strategies utilized to create a culture of health, understanding how new employees are socialized into this culture, identifying how employees may resist the culture, and exploring how resistance is addressed. Based on in-depth interviews with 19 5-Star AchieveWELL organizational representatives and grounded theory analysis of collected data, evident themes related to the goals of this study were identified. Key communication strategies to support a culture of health include using multiple communication channels, demonstrating leadership support, and being willing to adapt and change over time. New employees are socialized into the culture of health during the recruitment process as well as new employee orientation. Resistance to health and wellness occurs in the form of non-participation and employee push-back, with this resistance often being met with compassion. These results offer practical implications for organizations desiring to create a culture of health as well as theoretical implications for scholars studying organizational socialization.

This study investigates how Greenpeace, a non-profit environmental organization, and Preem, a for-profit fuel company, construct sustainability in their external communication. Through Foucauldian discourse analysis, we explore the interests, values, and discursive strategies employed by Greenpeace and Preem and how they shape sustainability discourses. Our findings reveal distinct perspectives on sustainability: Greenpeace emphasizes vast and complex environmental issues such as climate change, pollution, and destruction of nature, advocating for radical societal changes and global solutions. Aligning with the dominant sustainability discourse, Greenpeace strategically leverages its legitimacy to promote an alternative discourse. On the other hand, Preem opposes the holistic discourse of Greenpeace, advocating for incremental reform and technological innovation within the existing politico-economic system. Thus, both organizations assert their authority and employ discursive strategies to legitimize their interests. Greenpeace portrays sustainability as a struggle, underscoring the need for collective action, while Preem presents sustainability as a journey, emphasizing individual responsibility in line with a neoliberal ideology. Our research contributes to our understanding of sustainability discourses in organizational communication. It sheds light on how different actors strategically construct and communicate sustainability messages, focusing on the ideological foundations, values, and interests that underlie these discourses. By enhancing our understanding of discourse transformation in shaping legitimate sustainability actions, our findings have implications for policymakers, researchers, and society at large.

This paper examines how wine brands use emotional branding and narrative identities to connect with customers on Instagram. The research questions were as follows: How do winemakers use emotional branding in their communication on Instagram? How does the narrative that the company tells about itself relate to the customer's identity? To answer this, a semiotic analysis was made where three different wine producers were examined. For each wine producer, a profile overview and three posts were analyzed. The findings show that all three wine producers created content that corresponds to emotional branding for instance by trying to emphasize a connection to sentimental memories, socialization, lifestyles and ideals. By trying to create a narrative around the brand, they intend to attract consumers whose narrative identity corresponds to the identity of the brand. This is relevant knowledge for designers and marketing people in order to connect with consumers. Since the wine business has a great economic relevance, this knowledge can also be considered to be of general interest.

This master thesis investigates the potential downsides of transparency in crisis communication. Reputation and transparency studies focus primarily on external perspectives and academia lacks observations from internal perspectives. Crises like data breaches cause exponentially more damage each year and threaten intangible assets like reputation.  The authors conducted a quantitative survey research in which social media users were presented with background information about a fictional social media company, information about their relations with the company, and a short newspaper article investigating a data breach before being presented with the vignette, a press release. Participants were asked to rate the reputation of the company in several steps. In total 457 responses were collected.  The findings support the positive correlation between transparent crisis responses and reputation recovery. No evidence of negative consequences on internal reputation due to transparency was found. Crisis responses, even if not entirely transparent, can still positively affect reputation if perceived as appropriate. The research contributes insights into the impact of transparency on reputation and highlights its value as a key element in crisis communication and reputation management strategies, particularly for organizations in the social media industry facing data breaches.

<p>This study examines several emerging topics in strategic communication and information design. The first chapter studies the role of verification in persuasion and its interaction with commitment in a Bayesian persuasion framework in which the sender is not fully bound by the committed plan. Both theoretically and experimentally, we demonstrate that making verification easier can significantly improve information transmission when commitment is low, but its effect is limited when commitment is high. However, empirically receivers do not respond as strongly as predicted by theory, which is consistent with base-rate neglect and conservatism. On the other hand, senders generally anticipate receivers' actions and best respond to the empirical behavior of receivers. We provide empirical implications for cases where verification is instrumental in improving information transmission and where it is not. </p> <p><br></p> <p>The second and third chapters are based on joint work with Dr. Collin Raymond. In the second chapter, we investigate how increasing the complexity of the message space in the presence of limited memory can reduce misrepresentation in strategic communication. We enrich a standard cheap talk game so that senders must communicate not just a payoff-relevant state, but also payoff-irrelevant attributes correlated with the state.  We show that increasing the set of attributes that may need to be reported (i.e., the complexity of the game) improves the amount of information transmitted in equilibrium. Our findings demonstrate that the reporting of redundant information may induce equilibria that feature improved outcomes compared to simpler, more direct reporting systems, and point out the importance of complexity when trying to induce truthful information revelation.</p> <p><br></p> <p>In the third chapter, we analyze some extensions on the effect of complexity. We present experimental evidence which shows that  too much of an increase in complexity leads to a reversal of those gains. Limited memory on the part of players, as well as the relative complexity faced by senders and receivers, drives these changes, and individuals experience cognitive costs when dealing with complex environments that they are willing to pay to avoid. </p> <p><br></p>

The communication environment in which organizations operate is changing, not least due to the increasing digitalization. With social media platforms growing importance in a professional context, employees can become potent communicators with strategic relevance for organizations. Communication through these Corporate Influencers poses several challenges to organizations, as the established approaches and methods of strategic communication, as discussed in literature, can only partially be applied for this new form of communicators. Due to the novelty of this field there is a significant gap in academic literature. Therefore, this paper aims to explore the challenges connected to the communication of Corporate Influencers from an organizational perspective, moreover, offering first insights into an emerging field in the discipline of strategic communication. To address the research gap, this study pursued an exploratory, hence qualitative approach. Nine semi-structured interviews with experts in the field from nine different companies were conducted and analyzed using the Gioia method. Through this method, the author was able to identify eleven major challenges on different hierarchical levels, arising for organizations in connection to the communication of Corporate Influencers. The analysis suggested a strong interrelation between the singular challenges, presented in form of a dynamic model. By contrasting these papers findings against preexisting literature from the field of strategic communication, and in particular employee advocacy, this thesis concludes that a holistic view is necessary from an organizational perspective. While an adequate corporate culture is the prerequisite for all further efforts, the challenges on a managerial level are of equal importance to those on the employee level, as well as to the challenges surfacing when moving towards the operationalization. While the challenges need to be addressed individually for a successful Corporate Influencer communication, they should at all times be regarded in an overall organizational context.

To navigate the increasing sustainability pressures from regulatory bodies and various stakeholders, this research explores organizations’ strategic responses and communication strategies within the transport logistics sector, particularly focusing on Deutsche Post DHL Group. Grounded in institutional theory, this paper examines how these organizations adapt their strategies to be perceived as legitimate while balancing economic objectives with environmental obligations. The study employs a qualitative longitudinal analysis combined with a thematic analysis of secondary data from various reports, websites, and social media to comprehensively understand the evolution of strategic responses and communication practices within the transport logistics industry.  The findings reveal that DHL Group has progressively enhanced its transparency and specificity in sustainability reporting, driven by stricter regulations and rising stakeholder expectations. The organizations’ strategic responses, including strategies such as acquiescence, compromise, manipulation, justification, and decoupling, have evolved from initial resistance and superficial compliance to a more integrated and proactive approach, highlighting the balance between financial stability and sustainability initiatives. Furthermore, the research underscores the crucial role of strategic communication in influencing stakeholder perceptions and managing expectations to secure organizational legitimacy.

In recent decades, there have been significant changes in the Swedish population's tobacco habits, with a noticeable trend being the increased use of snus (moist powder tobacco). At the same time, corporate social responsibility (CSR) has become a prominent phenomenon, with organizations increasingly implementing CSR initiatives. This study investigates how Swedish Match utilizes CSR to enhance its legitimacy on its website, using a critical discourse analysis based on Fairclough's three-dimensional model. The study uses a theoretical framework based on van Leeuwen's legitimation theory and two CSR models, including the triple bottom line and Carroll's pyramid. Additionally, it draws upon Fairclough's central concept of discourse. The analysis shows that Swedish Match strategically employs CSR communication on its website to enhance its legitimacy. The results indicate a paradoxical CSR communication, where economic interests are implicitly expressed in the shadow of perceived heroic efforts. A consistent intertextuality demonstrates how Swedish Match borrows legitimacy from other established organizations without reference, leaving no room for readers to question or fact-check the communicated information. As the snus landscape continues to evolve due to changes in politics, increased usage, marketing strategies, and scientific advancements, there is a growing need to examine how these controversial brands utilize language to legitimize their sales. Consequently, this study contributes to a deeper understanding of how controversial industries can enhance their legitimacy through CSR communication.

This study investigates the rhetorical strategies used in Jimmie Åkesson's first AI-translated speech on immigration and integration, targeting Arabic-speaking communities in Sweden. It examines how Åkesson frames issues concerning Arabic immigrant minorities through various framing techniques and persuasive appeals and assesses the impact of these strategies on social identity dynamics. The theoretical framework encompasses framing theory and social identity theory, offering insights into rhetorical strategies, and social identity construction. Through qualitative rhetorical analysis, Åkesson's speeches reveal the strategic use of ethos, logos, pathos, and doxa, emphasizing emotional appeals and ingroup-outgroup dynamics. The findings suggest a narrative that reinforces Swedish national identity while potentially marginalizing immigrant communities. However, further examination is needed to assess the nuanced effects of AI-translated speeches on rhetorical choices and audience perceptions. These insights have implications for strategic communication in politics and raise ethical considerations regarding the use of AI in shaping public opinion on immigration.