Purpose:The purpose of this paper is to extend the understanding of stakeholders’ corporate reputation regarding a brand’s crisis communication.                                                                   Research Questions:  How are stakeholders’ cognitive reputation affected after exposure of the crisis communication and the generated eWOM? How are stakeholders’ affective reputation affected after exposure of the crisis communication and the generated eWOM?   Methodology:The research was of qualitative nature and had an explorative approach. The collection of data was done by semi-structured interviews based on a convenience sample of six respondents.  Findings:The results of this study indicated that the crisis communication had a higher impact on the respondents’ corporate reputation than the eWOM had. The generated eWOM worked as an influential factor of the corporate reputation rather than the dominant factor in connection to corporate reputation. The crisis communication is proposed to be a dominant factor affecting one’s corporate reputation of a brand, even though one’s corporate reputation of a brand previous to the crisis lays the foundation for how one is affected. Research limitations:Since this study applied the crisis communication of two fashion-retailer brands, there was a limitation by aiming the focus towards the fashion industry. Previous corporate reputation towards these two specific brands may also have affected the results.

This essay examines corporate reputation and reputation management online, where destinations were selected as an example of a reputation-dependent industry with special terms. The aim of this study is to examine how Swedish destinations strategically manage their reputation online. Furthermore, the thesis sees into six destinations in Sweden using a theoretical approach on how companies work with their reputation to prevent and nurture their reputation online from a public relations perspective. The result showed that the destinations work actively online to maintain their reputation. Their primary critical stakeholders are politicians and their visit nutrition, their secondary stakeholders are in the long term their own residents. The result also showed that the digitalization has led to both challenges and opportunities. There is thus, an internal challenge in finding resources and an external challenge to compete globally. The destinations determinedly work to measure and monitor their reputation online, but see management as complex today. This study concludes that some areas of online reputation management are found to be applicable for companies in general, but mainly Swedish destinations. In conclusion the study presents a model on how companies proactively can manage their reputation from a public relations point of view.

This report discusses the subject of corporate social responsibility (CSR) and CSR communication at Stadium. The study’s purpose is to study the role of sustainability in corporate social responsibility. This is executed through studying how Stadium chooses to communicate their sustainability practices externally. Furthermore, the report studies if and how Stadium’s CSR message reaches student consumers, and how it affects their opinions and consumer behavior. The gathered material is analyzed through the concept of CSR, reputation management and stakeholder theory. Our result shows that Stadium utilizes CSR as a business strategy, wants to contribute to a better society as well as gaining a more positive reputation. Stadium communicate the same sustainability information through the same communication channels to all stakeholders.We found that the student consumers are not reached by Stadium’s sustainability communication, and this is a contributing factor to why their opinions and consumer behavior at Stadium is unaffected. However, differences of opinion about whether sustainability practices affect the students’ view of Stadium arose - some would be affected by more sustainability information and for some it is rather a matter of price when making a purchase. The students believe that they would be better reached by Stadium’s sustainability message if it was communicated in stores. The report shows that sustainability is important for student consumers and also that inadequate communication decreases their opportunity to shop sustainably. It is less likely that a company’s reputation is affected in a positive way if sustainability is not adequately communicated / Uppsatsen behandlar företags sociala ansvar (CSR) och CSR-kommunikation på Stadium. Studiens syfte är att undersöka vilken roll hållbarhet har inom CSR. Detta görs genom att undersöka hur Stadium väljer att kommunicera sitt CSR-arbete externt, med fokus på hållbarhetsaspekten. Vidare undersöker studien huruvida Stadiums budskap når konsumentgruppen studenter och hur det i så fall påverkar konsumenternas åsikter och köpbeteende. Syftet uppnås genom att besvara tre frågeställningar med hjälp av intervjuer med representanter från Stadium samt student-fokusgupper. Det insamlade materialet från intervjuer och fokusgrupper analyseras utifrån CSR-konceptet, reputation management och stakeholder theory. Resultatet av undersökningen påvisar att Stadium vill bidra till ett bättre samhälle samt använder CSR som företagsstrategi, och vill att CSR-arbetet skall påverka sitt anseende positivt. Stadium kommunicerar samma hållbarhetinformation genom samma kommunikationskanaler till alla Stadiums intressenter (ex. genom hemsidan).Vidare framkom att studentkonsumenterna inte nås av Stadiums hållbarhetskommunikation, och att detta är en bidragande faktor till varför deras åsikter och köpbeteende på Stadium inte påverkas. Dock framkommer delade meningar huruvida studenternas syn på Stadium och beteende påverkas av hållbarhetsarbete - vissa skulle påverkas genom att få mer information och för vissa är det en prisfråga huruvida man handlar hållbart eller ej. Studenterna anser att de skulle nås bättre om hållbarhetsarbetet kommunicerades ut i butiksmiljön. Avslutningsvis visar studien på att hållbarhet är viktigt för studentkonsumenterna men att bristande kommunikation minskar deras möjlighet att handla hållbart. Det är mindre troligt att ett företags anseende påverkas positivt om hållbarhet inte kommuniceras tillräckligt.

In this paper I theorize about how a company’s corporate reputation and visibility can be affected by a scandal. Scandals are associated with negative outcomes such as bad reputation but this thesis investigates if there are some positive side-effects of a scandal in terms of increased visibility. The idea of it being better for companies to be infamous than unknown is studied using the empirical example of the payment service company Klarna AB, their scandal in April of 2014 is the focus of the thesis. The results show that the company’s visibility was affected in a positive way following the scandal since the number of articles about Klarna did increase after the scandal compared to before the scandal. Klarna’s visibility was also shown to increase through the higher number of customer reviews after the scandal. The measurements for corporate reputation of Klarna rose significantly after the scandal in comparison to before the scandal indicating that also Klarna’s reputation was positively affected by the scandal. The conclusion is that it is better to be infamous than unknown since there was something to gain from the scandal in terms of visibility and corporate reputation.

The purpose of the study is to examine the relationship between an organization's identity and its corporate reputation. The organization in focus is a Swedish travel agency. Although identity and reputation has been studied separately before, they are closely connected and have synergistic effects, in that they affect each other. Connecting the two fields can benefit both the profession and research. Not only that, it is also expected to occur as a result of the development of technology, where the internet has made it possible for organizations to communicate through their own channels and describe how they think about themselves, and thus affect the way they want to be perceived. To analyze the organization's identity and corporate reputation, and the relationship between them, the study uses a model developed by Huang-Horowitz and Freberg. To achieve the purpose, data is collected by two methods, qualitative text analysis and semi-structured interviews. The result shows that the organization's identity and reputation interact in a succesful way in two of three categories. A challenge for the object of study is to distinguish itself from its competitors, as the results shows.

The goal of this thesis is to implement reputation based trust management into the routing protocol of peer-to-peer network. This implementation is compared with current standard peer-to-peer security implementations - mostly no security at all and reputation based management without implementation in the routing mechanism. The objective is to improve routing performance and efficiency of secure algorithms.

No description available.

Thesis advisor: Ana M. Martinez-Aleman / This study explored the perceptions and influences of the respondents to the <italic>U.S. News &amp World Report</italic>'s (<italic>USNWR</italic>) reputational survey for graduate schools of education (GSOEs). These respondents represent two unique stakeholder groups for graduate programs of education: GSOE deans and school superintendents. The existing literature regarding the <italic>USNWR</italic> rankings has been predominantly quantitative, with an emphasis on methodological problems with the rankings. This study employed mixed methods: quantitative analysis to determine the weight of the reputational surveys in the rankings, and qualitative to explore the perceptions of the raters of reputation for GSOEs. This study highlights several unique challenges in the ranking of GSOEs, including the multiple missions and widely varying programs across schools of education. In particular the rankings fail to distinguish between the GSOE predominant dual purposes of preparing researchers and preparing practitioners. The rankings may be contributing to the divide between research and practice in the academy. This study confirms with the GSOE deans that the rankings do <italic>matter</italic>, on and off campus, influencing the public perception of their programs. At a weighting of 40%, as stated by <italic>USWNR</italic>, reputation carries the greatest weight of all categories of input variables in the rankings. In terms of the reputational survey respondent groups, this study finds a significant difference between their levels of engagement with the rankings. This study finds a lack of meaningful participation in the rankings by the superintendents, resulting in an input variable that is biased, methodologically flawed, and contributing to erroneous fluctuations in rank. In contrast, this study finds the GSOE deans are reluctant but active participants in the rankings. They are vested competitors in the rankings business. The results indicate that the dean holds a critical role in the reputation management of their programs. These findings suggest that the rankings steer the role of the deanship toward an external focus, with an emphasis on publicizing the scholarship and scholars of the GSOE, to establish and maintain a degree of prominence among peer GSOE deans. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2009. / Submitted to: Boston College. Lynch School of Education. / Discipline: Educational Administration and Higher Education.

Thesis advisor: Fabio Schiantarelli / Thesis advisor: Thomas J. Chemmanur / After the 2007 financial crisis, a big attention has been dedicated to credit ratings. Whether ratings are capable to provide the most precise and timely information is a question that has been tackled from different angles. The possibility to discipline credit ratings via a regulatory mechanism, the influence that ratings may play on corporate governance decisions and the information they deliver in comparison to other financial intermediaries are the main points that this dissertation aims to address. The first paper compares the behavior of standard or issuer-paid rating agencies, represented by Standard & Poors (S&P) to alternative or investor-paid rating agencies, represented by the Egan-Jones Ratings Company (EJR) after the Dodd- Frank Act regulation is approved. Results show that both S&P and EJR ratings are more conservative, stable and, on average, lower after the Dodd-Frank implementation. However, EJR ratings are higher for firms that may generate high revenue for the rater. Additionally, I find that, after the regulation, S&P cares more about its reputation. Exploiting a measure that captures the bond marketís ability to anticipate rating downgrades, I show that, after Dodd-Frank, bond market anticipation decreases for S&P but increases for EJR, suggesting that S&P ratings are timelier. Finally, I study how the bond market responds to rating changes and how firms perceive ratings in their decision to issue debt in the post-Dodd-Frank period. Results suggest that both S&P downgrades and upgrades generate a greater bond market re- sponse. On the contrary, only EJR upgrades have a magnified effect on bond market returns. The greater informativeness of S&P ratings after Dodd-Frank is confirmed by the meaningful impact of these ratings on firm debt issuance. The second paper (coauthored with Annamaria C. Menichini) studies the relationship between credit rating changes and CEO turnover beyond firm performance. Using an adverse selection model that explicitly incorporates rating change related turnover, our model predicts that a downgrade triggers turnover, more so the lower the managerial entrenchment, but that this relation is weaker when the report provided by the rating agency is more reliable. Our empirical results support these predictions. We show that downgrades explain forced turnover risk, with the new CEO chosen outside the firm that has received the negative credit rating change. In addition, we find that the relation between rating changes and management turnover is stronger when the degree of managerial entrenchment is low, for firms characterized by a high level of investment and for firms less exposed to rating fees. Finally, we show that this relation has weakened in the post-2007 crisis period, in coincidence with the increased reputational concerns of the rating agencies. The results are robust to endogeneity concerns. The third paper (coauthored with Thomas J. Chemmanur and Igor Karagodsky) focuses on equity analysts, issuer-paid and investor-paid ratings. Equity analysts' forecasts and ratings assigned by issuer-paid credit rating agencies such as Standard and Poorís (S&P) and by investor-paid rating agencies such as Egan and Jones (EJR) all involve information production about the same underlying set of firms, even though equity analysts focus on cash flows to equity and bond ratings focus on cash flows to bonds. Further, the two types of credit rating agencies differ in their incentives to produce and report accurate information signals. Given this setting, we empirically analyze the timeliness and accuracy of the information signals provided by each of the above three types of financial intermediary to their investor clienteles and the information flows between these intermediaries. We find that the information signals produced by EJR are the most timely (on average), and seem to anticipate the information signals produced by equity analysts as well as by S&P. We find that changes in leverage are associated with lower EJR ratings but higher equity analysts' recommendations; further, credit rating changes by EJR have the largest impact on firms' investment levels. We also document an investor attention effect (in the sense of Merton, 1987) among stock and bond market investors in the sense that changes in equity analyst recommendations have a higher impact than either EJR or S&P ratings changes on the excess returns on firm equity, while EJR rating changes have a higher impact on bond yield spreads than either S&P ratings changes or changes in equity analyst recommendations. Finally, we analyze differences in bond ratings assigned to a given firm by EJR and S&P, and find that these differences are positively related to the standard proxies for disagreement among stock market investors.

The social responsibility of corporations has become a topical issue. This is particularly so in relation to the ways and means of achieving harmony and congruency with social expectations. With the growing importance that corporations now place on meeting contemporary demands for extra-commercial engagement placed on them by society, regulating corporate activity in this area has come under intense public and legal scrutiny. In what can be described as a departure from the norm, the use of legislation to mandate and govern corporate social responsibility (CSR) is becoming increasingly perceived as an effective regulatory method in emerging economies. India, Mauritius, Indonesia and the Philippines have adopted legislation with regard to CSR. In Nigeria, however, several attempts at legislating on CSR have failed. This study shows that a multiplicity of factors is responsible for this development. This thesis posits that while the adoption of international CSR standards is encouraged through various international activities, only an autochthonous approach which recognises the peculiarities of the Nigerian state can promote the desired legislative objective on mandating CSR. This study explores the prospects of mandating CSR by legislation in Nigeria and suggests reforms deemed necessary for achieving the objective of mandatory CSR.