Corporatebranding

441

European Journal of MarketingVol 35 No 34 2001 pp 441-456

MCB University Press 0309-0566

Corporate branding andcorporate brand performance

Fiona HarrisOpen University Business School The Open University

Milton Keynes UK and

Leslie de ChernatonyThe Birmingham Business School The University of Birmingham UK

Keywords Corporate image Brands Brand identity Internal marketing

Abstract Corporate branding necessitates a different management approach It requiresgreater emphasis on factors internal to the organisation paying greater attention to the role ofemployees in the brand building process This paper explores the implications of corporatebranding for the management of internal brand resources We describe a model for managingbrands through narrowing the gap between a brandrsquos identity and its reputation and building onthis identify three key factors that affect brand perceptions and brand performance Finally wereview some of the mechanisms that may be used to facilitate greater congruence of brandperceptions within the brand team and communication of a brandrsquos identity to employees

IntroductionIn an era when the emphasis is moving from line branding to corporatebranding (Balmer 1995 Mitchell 1997) there is a need to better appreciate themanagement approach for corporate branding as this needs managingdifferently from line branding One of the key differences between line andcorporate branding is that the latter requires greater focus within theorganisation The size and composition of brand management teams arechanging requiring greater co-ordination of activities One of the implicationsof this is that corporate marketing necessitates not only a planning perspectivewhich addresses the matching of external opportunities with corecompetencies but also considers the integration of internal activities to ensurecohesion and therefore consistency in delivery

The role of employees is also changing No longer can they be subsumedunder the category the ` firmrsquorsquo (Freeman and Liedtka 1997) they need to berecognised as a brandrsquos ` ambassadorsrsquorsquo (Hemsley 1998) Employees constitutethe interface between a brandrsquos internal and external environments and canhave a powerful impact on consumersrsquo perceptions of both the brand and theorganisation (Schneider and Bowen 1985 Balmer and Wilkinson 1991)

Furthermore with the ubiquity of technology decreasing the potential forsustained competitive advantage managers are focusing more ondifferentiating their brands on the basis of unique emotional rather thanfunctional characteristics (de Chernatony et al 2001) A brandrsquos emotionalvalues are communicated not just by advertising but also through employeesrsquointeractions with different stakeholders Employees represent a source ofcustomer information and action needs to be taken to ensure this is compatible

The research register for this journal is available at

httpwwwm cbupcomresearch_registers

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at

httpwwwemerald-library comft

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

442

with the way senior management wishes the organisation to be perceived(Kennedy 1977) Employees are thus becoming central to the process of brandbuilding and their behaviour can either reinforce a brandrsquos advertised valuesor if inconsistent with these values undermine the credibility of advertisedmessages It is therefore crucial to look inside the organisation to consider howemployeesrsquo values and behaviour can be aligned with a brandrsquos desired values

A further reason for looking inside the organisation is the shift in thebranding literature from brand image (Boulding 1956) to brand identity(Kapferer 1997) While image focuses on consumersrsquo perceptions of branddifferentiation identity is more concerned with how managers and employeesmake a brand unique Managers first need to define a brandrsquos values and thenensure employeesrsquo values and behaviour are consistent with them Historicallymanagement has provided leadership through defining a brandrsquos valuesHowever with the recognition of corporate branding and therefore the criticalrole staff play they need to be included in the internal debate about defining abrandrsquos values While management will still be required to initiate the processstaff should be encouraged to contribute to discussions Externally managersneed to examine their brandrsquos reputation among stakeholders to ensure thebrandrsquos identity is communicated successfully and valued outcomes areconsistently delivered

This paper explores the implications of corporate branding for themanagement of internal brand resources A model for managing theseresources is described which conceptualises the process of brand building asthe management of brand identity such that the gap between a brandrsquos identityand its reputation is narrowed Building on this we examine the dynamics ofbrand management teams under corporate branding We identify some of thefactors that may affect the coherent leverage of internal resources and discusstheir managerial implications Finally we describe some of the mechanismsthat may be used to surface and harmonise brand perceptions

The identity-reputation gap model of brand managementCorporate branding requires a holistic approach to brand management inwhich all members of an organisation behave in accordance with the desiredbrand identity Following the International Corporate Identity Grouprsquosstatement on corporate identity (van Riel and Balmer 1997) corporate identityis interpreted as an organisationrsquos ethos aims and values that create a sense ofindividuality which differentiates a brand Building on Kapfererrsquos (1997) brand-based view of identity de Chernatony (1999) proposed a model of brandmanagement conceptualised as the process of narrowing the gap between abrandrsquos identity and its reputation as illustrated in Figure 1 Brand identityconsists of six components vision and culture which drive the brandrsquos desiredpositioning personality and subsequent relationships all of which are thenpresented to reflect stakeholdersrsquo actual and aspirational self-images Thecomponents of the model interact and are mutually reinforcing The individualcomponents are described in the following subsections

Corporatebranding

443

Brand vision and cultureAt the centre of brand identity are brand vision and culture Visionencompasses the brandrsquos core purpose plusmn its reason for being plusmn and its corevalues which provide a system of guiding principles (Collins and Porras 1996)Managers need to communicate their brandrsquos purpose to employees clearly inorder to inspire them and help them understand how their roles relate to it It isalso important to convey internally the brandrsquos core values because theseguide employeesrsquo behaviour Each brand will have a unique set of values thatare relevant to its target market but we argue that it is the consistency of theperception of those values as well as the nature of those values that is animportant characteristic of successful brands

The organisationrsquos culture encompasses employeesrsquo values andassumptions which also guide their behaviour particularly in novel situations(Wilkins and Ouchi 1983) Managers need to be attentive to their organisationrsquosculture and its alignment with the brandrsquos values since this could result ininconsistent behaviour and detrimentally affect stakeholdersrsquo perceptions of

Figure 1The identity-reputation

gap model of brandmanagement

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

444

the brand Corporate culture can represent a source of competitive advantage(Bettencourt and Brown 1997) but the culture needs to be appropriateadaptive and attentive to the needs of all stakeholders (Kotter and Heskett1992) Managers thus need to agree on the few core corporate values that willremain unchanged and the less central values that need to adapt to changingcircumstances

PositioningThe coherence between the brandrsquos vision and core values and the brandrsquospositioning next needs to be examined A brandrsquos positioning sets out what thebrand is who it is for and what it offers (Rositer and Percy 1996) Followingmeans-end theory (Gutman 1982) a set of functionally distinct capabilities thatdifferentiate a brand should be derived from the brandrsquos core values Thebrandrsquos positioning will be affected by artefacts akin to Kapfererrsquos (1997)` physiquersquorsquo which provide cues about the brandrsquos performance characteristics

PersonalityThe brandrsquos emotional characteristics are represented by the metaphor ofpersonality which amongst other sources evolves from the brandrsquos corevalues Personality traits are further developed through associations with the` typical userrsquorsquo imagery endorsers and consumersrsquo contacts with the companyrsquosemployees (Aaker 1997) Managers therefore need to ensure that a brandrsquospersonality is conveyed consistently by both its employees and externalcommunications Another influential source for a brandrsquos personality is itspositioning and an integrated approach to branding can help reinforce thesynergy between these

RelationshipsHaving nurtured a brandrsquos personality a relationship between the brand andits consumers evolves which is characterised by the values inherent in thebrandrsquos personality Consistent with Fournier (1998) consumer-brandrelationships are portrayed as being reciprocal in Figure 1 Through theirinteractions employees significantly affect a brandrsquos relationship with itsconsumers The consistency of these interactions is therefore crucial sincerelationships continually evolve and can be destabilised by changes from eitherpartner (Fournier and Yao 1997) Managers need to help employees understandthe types of relationships that are appropriate with other employeesconsumers and other stakeholders based on the brandrsquos core values

PresentationThe final component of brand identity involves the identification ofpresentation styles to present the brandrsquos identity so as to reflect consumersrsquoaspirations (cf Kapfererrsquos (1997) ` reflectionsrsquorsquo) and self-images (Belk 1988Hogg and Mitchell 1996) People respond more favourably to brands andcompanies they perceive as being consistent with their self-concepts (Dowling

Corporatebranding

445

1994) Brandsrsquo symbolic meanings also help consumers understand andexpress aspects of their selves to others (McCracken 1993) Both advertisingand employeesrsquo interactions with consumers contribute to the symbolicmeaning of a brand Thus managers need to be attentive to potentialincongruity between a brandrsquos desired symbolic meanings and those conveyedthrough advertising and employeesrsquo behaviour

ReputationSuccessful management of internal brand resources should result in afavourable brand reputation Adapting Fombrun and Rindovarsquos (1996)definition of reputation a brandrsquos reputation is defined as ` a collectiverepresentation of a brandrsquos past actions and results that describes the brandrsquosability to deliver valued outcomes to multiple stakeholdersrsquorsquo In contrast to abrandrsquos image which reflects current changing perceptions a brandrsquosreputation is more stable and represents the distillation of multiple images overtime (Fombrun and van Riel 1997) By encompassing the evaluations of allstakeholders reputation provides a much more representative indication ofbrand performance van Riel and Balmer (1997) also noted that the objective ofcorporate identity management was the establishment of a favourablereputation among an organisationrsquos stakeholders Familiarity with keystakeholdersrsquo perceptions is central to corporate brand management (Balmer1995) de Chernatonyrsquos (1999) model conceptualises the brand building processas revolving around the identification and narrowing of gaps between abrandrsquos identity and its reputation Managers therefore need to work with staffto reduce these gaps and eliminate sources of incongruity Strategies may thenbe fine-tuned to achieve a better match between identity and reputation Byincluding both internal and external components in the process the modelprovides a balanced approach to brand building

Perceptual congruity and brand performancede Chernatonyrsquos (1999) model emphasises the multidimensional nature of thecorporate branding concept which involves the co-ordination of internalresources (for example functional capabilities communication capabilities co-ordinating consistency through staff planning pricing customer service) tocreate a coherent brand identity and a favourable brand reputation Althoughbrand reputation encompasses the perceptions of all stakeholder groups tobegin to appreciate the importance of internal brand resources we focus on twostakeholder groups an organisationrsquos employees and its consumers

Brands are multidimensional entities whose success requires matching afirmrsquos functional and emotional values with consumersrsquo performance andpsychosocial needs (de Chernatony and DallrsquoOlmo Riley 1998) Corporatebranding thus relies heavily on an organisationrsquos members holding congruentperceptions about the nature of their brand However with corporate brandingthe teams responsible for managing brands are becoming larger and thecomposition of their members more diverse We define a brand management

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

446

team as comprising those people responsible for designing and developing thebrand strategy This could include both internal staff (marketing customerservice corporate affairs etc) and those in external agencies working on thebrand The potential for misperceptions of a brand internally as well asexternally is therefore substantial

Perception depends on a personrsquos expectations and previous knowledge aswell as the information presented by the stimulus in this case the brand(Eysenck and Keane 1990) People at different seniority levels and fromdifferent departments tend to have differing information and decision criteria(Tjosvold 1987) Thus managers and employees are likely to differ in theirperceptions of their brandrsquos identity Indeed research has shown thatmanagersrsquo perceptions may differ from each other (de Chernatony et al 1993Reger 1990) Furthermore differences in managersrsquo functional backgroundscan result in selective perception and imperception (Beyer et al 1997)Managersrsquo perceptions have also been found to differ from those of sales staff(DelVecchio 1998) Congruent perceptions will therefore be crucial in thesuccessful management of corporate brands Specifically we propose

P1 There is a positive correlation between brand performance and thecongruence of the brand team membersrsquo perceptions about the nature oftheir brand

P2 There is a positive correlation between brand performance and thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and consumersrsquo perceptionsabout the nature of their brand

P3 There is a positive correlation between brand performance and thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptions aboutthe nature of their brand

Corporate branding involves multiple stakeholders interacting with numerousstaff across many departments in an organisation (Mitchell 1997) Effectivecorporate branding requires consistent messages about a brandrsquos identity anduniform delivery across all stakeholder groups to create a favourable brandreputation Internal consistency and congruency are vital to the successfulexternal communication of corporate identity (Abratt 1989) It is thereforeimportant that managers identify mechanisms for surfacing diverseperceptions to resolve inconsistencies Members of the brand team first need tosurface their own perceptions and clarify their brandrsquos intended identity Theyshould then work with employees to ensure their perceptions align with theintended brand identity As a further coherency check employees should beencouraged to provide feedback about how they believe consumers perceive thebrand

To build a coherent brand identity managers need to understand the factorsthat can affect the congruency of perceptions This will help them identifypotential problems and put in place appropriate mechanisms to minimiseincongruity We consider next the factors we believe affect the congruency of

Corporatebranding

447

perceptions within an organisation and how these influence brandperformance

Building the corporate brand through internal mechanismsA review of the literature (eg Tajfel and Fraser 1978 Wagner et al 1984 Murray1989 Smith et al 1994) suggested three key factors affect perceptual congruity thesimilarity of brand team members shared values and communication Figure 2shows how we believe these factors affect the congruency of perceptions and brandperformance The strength of this model is that it examines the effects of variousintervening variables on performance For example Carroll and Harrison (1998)could find only three studies that had examined intervening variables betweenorganisational demography and performance

In the following subsections we explore the impact of these internal factorsand examine the managerial implications of each

Similarity of brand team membersAs previously noted brand teams are larger with corporate branding and morediverse in their membership The resulting heterogeneity poses a challenge tothe formation of congruent perceptions which are crucial for effective leverageof brand resources and consequently brand performance The literature onteam composition typically defines similarity in terms of age experienceeducation team and organisations tenure and functional background (egBantel and Jackson 1989 Hambrick and Mason 1984 Smith et al 1994)Teams composed of members with dissimilar characteristics are likely to differwith respect to values (Bantel and Jackson 1989) and exhibit greater conflict(Murray 1989) Heterogeneous teams also tend to be associated with poorercommunication team integration and consensus building (Lichtenstein et al1997)

By contrast team members with similar characteristics are more likely tohave similar experiences and perspectives (Robbins 1991) shared values(Bantel and Jackson 1989) and communicate easily (Wagner et al 1984) For

Figure 2The relationships

between internal brandresources and brand

performance

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

448

example people who join an organisation at the same time are more likely toshare common experiences and have similar job values and orientations(Lichtenstein et al 1997) The sharing of common values results in betterconsensus (Erez 1992) Thus we postulate

P4 The greater the similarity of brand team members the more congruentwill be their perceptions about the nature of their brand

However the growing team heterogeneity with corporate branding does havesome benefits Heterogeneous teams offer a wider range of skills andknowledge and are less susceptible to the limitations of ` groupthinkrsquorsquo (Janis1972) Bantel and Jackson (1989) concluded that heterogeneity was beneficialfor tasks that involved complex problem solving and that heterogeneous teamswere more innovative In addition Murray (1989) suggested that heterogeneousgroups would be responsive to change Although heterogeneous teams areprone to conflict Priem et al (1995) argued that cognitive conflict that wasexpressed and resolved would produce stronger consensus than the prematureconsensus of teams that attempted to smooth over latent disagreement Thekey issue is thus whether heterogeneous brand teams can arrive at congruentbrand perceptions

Over time teams tend towards increasingly similar perceptions As teammembers work together the effects of surface-level (demographic) diversitydecrease (Harrison et al 1998) In addition conflict is reduced and groupcohesiveness grows as people interact and come to know each other better(Robbins 1991) Difficulties in communication should also recede over time ascommunication becomes easier between people used to working with eachother (Zenger and Lawrence 1989) Turnover is also higher among moredissimilar team members (Wagner et al 1984) Hence we postulate

P5 The longer the team tenure of heterogeneous brand teams the morecongruent will be their perceptions about the nature of their brand

However rather than leaving these tendencies to take effect over timeconstructive action should be taken to harness the strengths of heterogeneousteams while minimising the potential barriers to coherent management of abrandrsquos identity This is particularly important given that marketers tend tochange jobs frequently (Beyaztas 1998) We recommend that mechanisms beput in place to facilitate the surfacing and resolving of incongruent brandperceptions among brand team members Such mechanisms are discussed inthe section plusmn Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptions

Shared valuesPeople who share similar values tend to perceive things in similar ways(Meglino and Ravlin 1998) Deal and Kennedy (1982) argued that successfulorganisations placed great emphasis on making their values explicit andensuring they were known and shared by employees Top managementrsquos

Corporatebranding

449

values shape the perceptions and interpretations of an organisation (Hambrickand Mason 1984 GuilleAcircn 1994) Shared organisational values also provideemployees with guidance about desired behaviour (McDonald and Gantz1991) It is thus important with corporate branding that the brandrsquos and theorganisationrsquos values are consistent Shared values will play an important partin facilitating congruent brand perceptions and coherent actions both withinthe brand team and across the organisation They are also instrumental incommunicating the organisation to the outside world (Deal and Kennedy 1982)We therefore posit

P6 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the organisation and the values of the brand

Organisational performance is a function of its membersrsquo degree ofinvolvement and participation (Brown 1995) With corporate brandingorganisational and brand performance are closely entwined Erez (1992)reported that the sharing of common values resulted in greater consensus andcommitment to those values Thus we posit

P7 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe personal values of members of the brand team and the values of theorganisation

P8 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe personal values of employees and the values of the organisation

In addition to organisational values personal values also guide individualsrsquobehaviour (Rokeach 1973 Melgino and Ravlin 1998) Thus we expect thegreater the congruence between team membersrsquo and employeersquos personalvalues and those of the brand the more likely that managers and employeeswill act in accordance with the corporate brandrsquos values and the more coherentwill be the brandrsquos identity We therefore propose

P9 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the brand and the personal values of the brand team

P10 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the brand and the personal values of employees

However it is possible that an organisationrsquos shared values may beinappropriate for its continuing success (Deal and Kennedy 1982) Visionarycompanies nurture their core values and adapt to changing circumstanceswithout compromising them (Collins and Porras 1996) Kotter and Heskett(1992) proposed that values which helped organisations adapt were associatedwith sustained excellent performance Managers thus need to agree which aretheir core values that need to be sustained and which values should adapt ascircumstances change (de Chernatony 1999) Thus we postulate

P11 Strong shared organisational values that are appropriate and adaptivewill be positively associated with superior brand performance

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

450

CommunicationDubrin (1994 p 336) defined communication as

The sending receiving and understanding of messages It is also the basic process by whichmanagers and professionals accomplish their work The purpose of communication is togather process and disseminate information

Communication plays an important role in the formation of congruentperceptions (Gilly and Woolfinbarger 1998 Bowman and Ambrosini 1996)Furthermore Balmer (1995) suggested that an unfavourable image could resultfrom the mismanagement of communication We argue that communicationwill fulfil a vital role in surfacing perceptions and that effective communicationwill enable incongruent perceptions to be identified and resolved Tounderstand how communication will affect the congruence of perceptionsamong members of the brand team and between the brand team andemployees we examine communication at both the team and organisationallevels In the following subsections communication encompasses allcommunication among managers and staff in the course of their workactivities This includes both general communication and communicationspecifically relating to the corporate brand Our justification for focusing oncommunication as a whole is that the literature suggests that this affectsperceptual congruency (eg Wagner et al 1984 DelVecchio 1998) However aspart of our current empirical research we are in addition exploring the natureand effectiveness of specific communications about the corporate brand

Communication at the team level Communication is easier in teams whosemembers are similar to each other (Wagner et al 1984 Harrison et al 1998) orare used to working together (Zenger and Lawrence 1989) More importantlythe interpretation of communication is better between more similar individuals(Robbins 1991) Thus homogeneous brand teams are also expected to havemore congruent perceptions because they are less likely to misunderstand eachother

Although communication within heterogeneous teams is typically moredifficult (Lichtenstein et al 1997 Zenger and Lawrence 1989) improving theircommunication will enable these teams to take advantage of the rich resourcesrepresented by their diversity For example greater frequency ofcommunication is likely to increase the similarity of their perceptions (Wagneret al 1984) The more frequently team members communicate with each otherthe more opportunities they will have to surface their perceptions regardingtheir brandrsquos identity and appreciate other membersrsquo perceptions Furthermorewhen conflicts are resolved co-operatively through individuals working out thedifferences between themselves more information is considered andintegrative solutions are likely to result rather than compromises (Maier 1967)Team members are also more likely to have favourable attitudes toward theoutcome (Ruekert and Walker (1987) We therefore propose

P12 The greater the similarities between members of the brand team themore informal and frequent the communication between them

Corporatebranding

451

P13 The more frequent the communication between members of the brandteam the greater the congruence between their perceptions about thenature of their brand

P14 The more stable the membership of the brand management team themore informal and frequent the communication between teammembers

Communication at the organisational level When all members of anorganisation understand their brandrsquos identity they are better able to act in amore coherent manner enhancing the likelihood of their activities supportingthe desired identity Maier (1967) maintained that many organisationalproblems could be attributed to inadequate communication between superiorsand their subordinates whose task it was to implement their decisionsCommunication between the brand team and employees will be crucial to theirperceptual congruity DelVecchio (1998) reported that greater interactionbetween managers and sales staff reduced their perceptual differences Wetherefore propose

P15 The more frequent the communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions about thenature of their brand

The nature as well as the frequency of communication is also expected toaffect the congruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsFisher et al (1997) reported that the bidirectionality of communication was asimportant as communication frequency in producing positive interfunctionaloutcomes Gilly and Woolfinbarger (1998) suggested that the congruence ofperceptions about an organisationrsquos advertisements was enhanced by two-waycommunication between management and employees Two-waycommunication provides the opportunity to assess how accurately thecommunication has been understood (Robbins 1991) Therefore we propose

P16 The greater the two-way communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions of their brand

The brand team needs to ensure that all forms of brand communicationspresent a coherent brand identity Employeesrsquo perceptions of their brand will bebased not only on what the brand team tells them but also on their ownexperience with the brand and brand advertisements Gilly and Woolfinbarger(1998) noted that consumer advertising was an important means ofcommunicating with employees and that consumer advertisements affected theway they perceived their service roles Employees were more accepting ofadvertisements when decision makers communicated with them about theadvertisements Hence the brand team should explain to employees not onlythe brandrsquos identity but also how other forms of brand communication areintended to reflect that identity Leaving such brand communications open to

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

452

interpretation is likely to increase incongruous brand perceptions amongemployees Hence we propose

P17 Explaining to employees how consumer advertisements are designedto communicate the corporate brand identity will increase thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsabout the nature of the brand

Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptionsWe now discuss mechanisms that can be used to help brand teams andemployees surface and harmonise their perceptions and develop congruentbrand perceptions

One approach is to use an independent facilitator (de Chernatony andDaniels 1994) The facilitator collates team membersrsquo anonymous individualbrand perceptions and then leads a workshop in which the range of perceptionsare discussed and a consensus reached regarding each of the brand identitycomponents This approach allows diverse views to be debated openly withthe facilitator ensuring they are each given due consideration The facilitatoras an impartial co-ordinator reduces the potential for conflict and preventsdomination of any team members Heterogeneous teams should find thisapproach particularly beneficial

Two techniques used in strategic decision making to assist the expressionand resolution of perceptions are dialectical inquiry (DI) and devilrsquos advocacy(DA) (Schweiger et al 1986) DI involves inducing maximal conflict byrequiring a team to debate two opposing views DA induces conflict throughthe consideration and critique of one view These techniques may be used byheterogeneous brand teams to legitimise and manage conflicting views aboutthe nature of the brand They should thus maximise the benefits of teamdiversity and result in greater consensus by allowing conflicting perceptions tobe expressed and resolved (cf Priem et al 1995) By forcing wider debate thesetechniques may also be used by homogeneous brand teams to counteract thepossibility of groupthink (Janis 1972)

A powerful device for creating a coherent focus among large numbers ofindividuals engaged in the development of a common concept was described byDumas (1994) in relation to design Dumas (1994) advocated the use of object-based metaphors called ` totemsrsquorsquo to build shared mental models Totems mayconsist of visual photographs or images and a set of words and provide agestalt that makes explicit the collective tacit knowledge of a team ofindividuals from a range of functional backgrounds Examples include ` tallboyrsquorsquo as a metaphor for the Honda ` Cityrsquorsquo (Clark and Fujimoto 1990) and ` rugbyplayer in a business suitrsquorsquo for the Honda ` Accordrsquorsquo (Nonaka 1991) AlthoughDumas (1994) described the use of totems by design teams developing newproducts the process may be used by brand teams as a simplifying andunifying device to reflect de Chernatonyrsquos (1999) six brand identitycomponents The brand team could then use a totem to help communicate abrandrsquos identity to employees and guide their behaviour accordingly

Corporatebranding

453

To gain employeesrsquo commitment to a brandrsquos identity it is important toestablish staff communication programmes Internal organisationalcommunication is crucial for providing and obtaining information achievingunderstanding and gaining employeesrsquo commitment (Gilly and Woolfinbarger1998) Employees need to know what is expected of them and how they cancontribute to the brandrsquos identity through their behaviour For example BUPARailtrack and Great North Eastern Railway have all introduced internalprogrammes to inform employees about their brand values and involve them inacting as ` ambassadorsrsquorsquo for their brands (Mistry 1998 Hemsley 1998 Wilson1998) Involvement facilitates understanding and consensus (Maier 1967Wooldridge and Floyd 1990) It is therefore important that employees areactively involved in the process of building a brandrsquos identity

Concluding remarksCorporate branding requires increased emphasis on internal brand resources topresent a coherent brand identity to stakeholders de Chernatonyrsquos (1999)identity-reputation gap model of brand management conceptualises brandbuilding as the process of narrowing the gap between brand identity and brandreputation Building on this we have identified key internal factors that wepropose affect the leverage of brand resources to enhance brand performanceEmployees play a crucial role in the brand building process and managers canfurther lever their brand potential by striving to achieve greater congruenceamong members of the brand team and between the team and other employeesIt is therefore crucial that corporate marketers adopt a planning perspectivewhich incorporates both internal pan-company marketing as well as thetraditional external perspective to ensure that there is synergy betweenemployeesrsquo actions resulting in optimising consumersrsquo satisfaction

Organisations also need to pay attention to the composition of their brandteams and be aware of their strengths and weaknesses The increasingheterogeneity of brand teams under corporate branding should enhance theresources of the brand team but will require greater emphasis on integration toarrive at congruent brand perceptions Organisations will need to considercarefully the appointment of new members to the brand team taking intoaccount the teamrsquos composition and whether new and existing members will beable to work together We have reviewed some of the mechanisms that may beused to assist the brand team in surfacing their perceptions and resolving anyinconsistencies Such mechanisms can help in the creation of a coherent brandidentity Organisations should then consider initiating internal programmes tocommunicate the brandrsquos identity to employees

We have recently embarked on empirical research to test our model of brandidentity and the internal factors we believe influence brand perceptions andperformance Our findings will be reported in future publications

References

Aaker JL (1997) ` Dimensions of brand personalityrsquorsquo Journal of Marketing Research Vol 34August pp 347-56

Corporatebranding

443

Brand vision and cultureAt the centre of brand identity are brand vision and culture Visionencompasses the brandrsquos core purpose plusmn its reason for being plusmn and its corevalues which provide a system of guiding principles (Collins and Porras 1996)Managers need to communicate their brandrsquos purpose to employees clearly inorder to inspire them and help them understand how their roles relate to it It isalso important to convey internally the brandrsquos core values because theseguide employeesrsquo behaviour Each brand will have a unique set of values thatare relevant to its target market but we argue that it is the consistency of theperception of those values as well as the nature of those values that is animportant characteristic of successful brands

The organisationrsquos culture encompasses employeesrsquo values andassumptions which also guide their behaviour particularly in novel situations(Wilkins and Ouchi 1983) Managers need to be attentive to their organisationrsquosculture and its alignment with the brandrsquos values since this could result ininconsistent behaviour and detrimentally affect stakeholdersrsquo perceptions of

Figure 1The identity-reputation

gap model of brandmanagement

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

444

the brand Corporate culture can represent a source of competitive advantage(Bettencourt and Brown 1997) but the culture needs to be appropriateadaptive and attentive to the needs of all stakeholders (Kotter and Heskett1992) Managers thus need to agree on the few core corporate values that willremain unchanged and the less central values that need to adapt to changingcircumstances

PositioningThe coherence between the brandrsquos vision and core values and the brandrsquospositioning next needs to be examined A brandrsquos positioning sets out what thebrand is who it is for and what it offers (Rositer and Percy 1996) Followingmeans-end theory (Gutman 1982) a set of functionally distinct capabilities thatdifferentiate a brand should be derived from the brandrsquos core values Thebrandrsquos positioning will be affected by artefacts akin to Kapfererrsquos (1997)` physiquersquorsquo which provide cues about the brandrsquos performance characteristics

PersonalityThe brandrsquos emotional characteristics are represented by the metaphor ofpersonality which amongst other sources evolves from the brandrsquos corevalues Personality traits are further developed through associations with the` typical userrsquorsquo imagery endorsers and consumersrsquo contacts with the companyrsquosemployees (Aaker 1997) Managers therefore need to ensure that a brandrsquospersonality is conveyed consistently by both its employees and externalcommunications Another influential source for a brandrsquos personality is itspositioning and an integrated approach to branding can help reinforce thesynergy between these

RelationshipsHaving nurtured a brandrsquos personality a relationship between the brand andits consumers evolves which is characterised by the values inherent in thebrandrsquos personality Consistent with Fournier (1998) consumer-brandrelationships are portrayed as being reciprocal in Figure 1 Through theirinteractions employees significantly affect a brandrsquos relationship with itsconsumers The consistency of these interactions is therefore crucial sincerelationships continually evolve and can be destabilised by changes from eitherpartner (Fournier and Yao 1997) Managers need to help employees understandthe types of relationships that are appropriate with other employeesconsumers and other stakeholders based on the brandrsquos core values

PresentationThe final component of brand identity involves the identification ofpresentation styles to present the brandrsquos identity so as to reflect consumersrsquoaspirations (cf Kapfererrsquos (1997) ` reflectionsrsquorsquo) and self-images (Belk 1988Hogg and Mitchell 1996) People respond more favourably to brands andcompanies they perceive as being consistent with their self-concepts (Dowling

Corporatebranding

445

1994) Brandsrsquo symbolic meanings also help consumers understand andexpress aspects of their selves to others (McCracken 1993) Both advertisingand employeesrsquo interactions with consumers contribute to the symbolicmeaning of a brand Thus managers need to be attentive to potentialincongruity between a brandrsquos desired symbolic meanings and those conveyedthrough advertising and employeesrsquo behaviour

ReputationSuccessful management of internal brand resources should result in afavourable brand reputation Adapting Fombrun and Rindovarsquos (1996)definition of reputation a brandrsquos reputation is defined as ` a collectiverepresentation of a brandrsquos past actions and results that describes the brandrsquosability to deliver valued outcomes to multiple stakeholdersrsquorsquo In contrast to abrandrsquos image which reflects current changing perceptions a brandrsquosreputation is more stable and represents the distillation of multiple images overtime (Fombrun and van Riel 1997) By encompassing the evaluations of allstakeholders reputation provides a much more representative indication ofbrand performance van Riel and Balmer (1997) also noted that the objective ofcorporate identity management was the establishment of a favourablereputation among an organisationrsquos stakeholders Familiarity with keystakeholdersrsquo perceptions is central to corporate brand management (Balmer1995) de Chernatonyrsquos (1999) model conceptualises the brand building processas revolving around the identification and narrowing of gaps between abrandrsquos identity and its reputation Managers therefore need to work with staffto reduce these gaps and eliminate sources of incongruity Strategies may thenbe fine-tuned to achieve a better match between identity and reputation Byincluding both internal and external components in the process the modelprovides a balanced approach to brand building

Perceptual congruity and brand performancede Chernatonyrsquos (1999) model emphasises the multidimensional nature of thecorporate branding concept which involves the co-ordination of internalresources (for example functional capabilities communication capabilities co-ordinating consistency through staff planning pricing customer service) tocreate a coherent brand identity and a favourable brand reputation Althoughbrand reputation encompasses the perceptions of all stakeholder groups tobegin to appreciate the importance of internal brand resources we focus on twostakeholder groups an organisationrsquos employees and its consumers

Brands are multidimensional entities whose success requires matching afirmrsquos functional and emotional values with consumersrsquo performance andpsychosocial needs (de Chernatony and DallrsquoOlmo Riley 1998) Corporatebranding thus relies heavily on an organisationrsquos members holding congruentperceptions about the nature of their brand However with corporate brandingthe teams responsible for managing brands are becoming larger and thecomposition of their members more diverse We define a brand management

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

446

team as comprising those people responsible for designing and developing thebrand strategy This could include both internal staff (marketing customerservice corporate affairs etc) and those in external agencies working on thebrand The potential for misperceptions of a brand internally as well asexternally is therefore substantial

Perception depends on a personrsquos expectations and previous knowledge aswell as the information presented by the stimulus in this case the brand(Eysenck and Keane 1990) People at different seniority levels and fromdifferent departments tend to have differing information and decision criteria(Tjosvold 1987) Thus managers and employees are likely to differ in theirperceptions of their brandrsquos identity Indeed research has shown thatmanagersrsquo perceptions may differ from each other (de Chernatony et al 1993Reger 1990) Furthermore differences in managersrsquo functional backgroundscan result in selective perception and imperception (Beyer et al 1997)Managersrsquo perceptions have also been found to differ from those of sales staff(DelVecchio 1998) Congruent perceptions will therefore be crucial in thesuccessful management of corporate brands Specifically we propose

P1 There is a positive correlation between brand performance and thecongruence of the brand team membersrsquo perceptions about the nature oftheir brand

P2 There is a positive correlation between brand performance and thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and consumersrsquo perceptionsabout the nature of their brand

P3 There is a positive correlation between brand performance and thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptions aboutthe nature of their brand

Corporate branding involves multiple stakeholders interacting with numerousstaff across many departments in an organisation (Mitchell 1997) Effectivecorporate branding requires consistent messages about a brandrsquos identity anduniform delivery across all stakeholder groups to create a favourable brandreputation Internal consistency and congruency are vital to the successfulexternal communication of corporate identity (Abratt 1989) It is thereforeimportant that managers identify mechanisms for surfacing diverseperceptions to resolve inconsistencies Members of the brand team first need tosurface their own perceptions and clarify their brandrsquos intended identity Theyshould then work with employees to ensure their perceptions align with theintended brand identity As a further coherency check employees should beencouraged to provide feedback about how they believe consumers perceive thebrand

To build a coherent brand identity managers need to understand the factorsthat can affect the congruency of perceptions This will help them identifypotential problems and put in place appropriate mechanisms to minimiseincongruity We consider next the factors we believe affect the congruency of

Corporatebranding

447

perceptions within an organisation and how these influence brandperformance

Building the corporate brand through internal mechanismsA review of the literature (eg Tajfel and Fraser 1978 Wagner et al 1984 Murray1989 Smith et al 1994) suggested three key factors affect perceptual congruity thesimilarity of brand team members shared values and communication Figure 2shows how we believe these factors affect the congruency of perceptions and brandperformance The strength of this model is that it examines the effects of variousintervening variables on performance For example Carroll and Harrison (1998)could find only three studies that had examined intervening variables betweenorganisational demography and performance

In the following subsections we explore the impact of these internal factorsand examine the managerial implications of each

Similarity of brand team membersAs previously noted brand teams are larger with corporate branding and morediverse in their membership The resulting heterogeneity poses a challenge tothe formation of congruent perceptions which are crucial for effective leverageof brand resources and consequently brand performance The literature onteam composition typically defines similarity in terms of age experienceeducation team and organisations tenure and functional background (egBantel and Jackson 1989 Hambrick and Mason 1984 Smith et al 1994)Teams composed of members with dissimilar characteristics are likely to differwith respect to values (Bantel and Jackson 1989) and exhibit greater conflict(Murray 1989) Heterogeneous teams also tend to be associated with poorercommunication team integration and consensus building (Lichtenstein et al1997)

By contrast team members with similar characteristics are more likely tohave similar experiences and perspectives (Robbins 1991) shared values(Bantel and Jackson 1989) and communicate easily (Wagner et al 1984) For

Figure 2The relationships

between internal brandresources and brand

performance

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

448

example people who join an organisation at the same time are more likely toshare common experiences and have similar job values and orientations(Lichtenstein et al 1997) The sharing of common values results in betterconsensus (Erez 1992) Thus we postulate

P4 The greater the similarity of brand team members the more congruentwill be their perceptions about the nature of their brand

However the growing team heterogeneity with corporate branding does havesome benefits Heterogeneous teams offer a wider range of skills andknowledge and are less susceptible to the limitations of ` groupthinkrsquorsquo (Janis1972) Bantel and Jackson (1989) concluded that heterogeneity was beneficialfor tasks that involved complex problem solving and that heterogeneous teamswere more innovative In addition Murray (1989) suggested that heterogeneousgroups would be responsive to change Although heterogeneous teams areprone to conflict Priem et al (1995) argued that cognitive conflict that wasexpressed and resolved would produce stronger consensus than the prematureconsensus of teams that attempted to smooth over latent disagreement Thekey issue is thus whether heterogeneous brand teams can arrive at congruentbrand perceptions

Over time teams tend towards increasingly similar perceptions As teammembers work together the effects of surface-level (demographic) diversitydecrease (Harrison et al 1998) In addition conflict is reduced and groupcohesiveness grows as people interact and come to know each other better(Robbins 1991) Difficulties in communication should also recede over time ascommunication becomes easier between people used to working with eachother (Zenger and Lawrence 1989) Turnover is also higher among moredissimilar team members (Wagner et al 1984) Hence we postulate

P5 The longer the team tenure of heterogeneous brand teams the morecongruent will be their perceptions about the nature of their brand

However rather than leaving these tendencies to take effect over timeconstructive action should be taken to harness the strengths of heterogeneousteams while minimising the potential barriers to coherent management of abrandrsquos identity This is particularly important given that marketers tend tochange jobs frequently (Beyaztas 1998) We recommend that mechanisms beput in place to facilitate the surfacing and resolving of incongruent brandperceptions among brand team members Such mechanisms are discussed inthe section plusmn Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptions

Shared valuesPeople who share similar values tend to perceive things in similar ways(Meglino and Ravlin 1998) Deal and Kennedy (1982) argued that successfulorganisations placed great emphasis on making their values explicit andensuring they were known and shared by employees Top managementrsquos

Corporatebranding

449

values shape the perceptions and interpretations of an organisation (Hambrickand Mason 1984 GuilleAcircn 1994) Shared organisational values also provideemployees with guidance about desired behaviour (McDonald and Gantz1991) It is thus important with corporate branding that the brandrsquos and theorganisationrsquos values are consistent Shared values will play an important partin facilitating congruent brand perceptions and coherent actions both withinthe brand team and across the organisation They are also instrumental incommunicating the organisation to the outside world (Deal and Kennedy 1982)We therefore posit

P6 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the organisation and the values of the brand

Organisational performance is a function of its membersrsquo degree ofinvolvement and participation (Brown 1995) With corporate brandingorganisational and brand performance are closely entwined Erez (1992)reported that the sharing of common values resulted in greater consensus andcommitment to those values Thus we posit

P7 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe personal values of members of the brand team and the values of theorganisation

P8 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe personal values of employees and the values of the organisation

In addition to organisational values personal values also guide individualsrsquobehaviour (Rokeach 1973 Melgino and Ravlin 1998) Thus we expect thegreater the congruence between team membersrsquo and employeersquos personalvalues and those of the brand the more likely that managers and employeeswill act in accordance with the corporate brandrsquos values and the more coherentwill be the brandrsquos identity We therefore propose

P9 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the brand and the personal values of the brand team

P10 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the brand and the personal values of employees

However it is possible that an organisationrsquos shared values may beinappropriate for its continuing success (Deal and Kennedy 1982) Visionarycompanies nurture their core values and adapt to changing circumstanceswithout compromising them (Collins and Porras 1996) Kotter and Heskett(1992) proposed that values which helped organisations adapt were associatedwith sustained excellent performance Managers thus need to agree which aretheir core values that need to be sustained and which values should adapt ascircumstances change (de Chernatony 1999) Thus we postulate

P11 Strong shared organisational values that are appropriate and adaptivewill be positively associated with superior brand performance

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

450

CommunicationDubrin (1994 p 336) defined communication as

The sending receiving and understanding of messages It is also the basic process by whichmanagers and professionals accomplish their work The purpose of communication is togather process and disseminate information

Communication plays an important role in the formation of congruentperceptions (Gilly and Woolfinbarger 1998 Bowman and Ambrosini 1996)Furthermore Balmer (1995) suggested that an unfavourable image could resultfrom the mismanagement of communication We argue that communicationwill fulfil a vital role in surfacing perceptions and that effective communicationwill enable incongruent perceptions to be identified and resolved Tounderstand how communication will affect the congruence of perceptionsamong members of the brand team and between the brand team andemployees we examine communication at both the team and organisationallevels In the following subsections communication encompasses allcommunication among managers and staff in the course of their workactivities This includes both general communication and communicationspecifically relating to the corporate brand Our justification for focusing oncommunication as a whole is that the literature suggests that this affectsperceptual congruency (eg Wagner et al 1984 DelVecchio 1998) However aspart of our current empirical research we are in addition exploring the natureand effectiveness of specific communications about the corporate brand

Communication at the team level Communication is easier in teams whosemembers are similar to each other (Wagner et al 1984 Harrison et al 1998) orare used to working together (Zenger and Lawrence 1989) More importantlythe interpretation of communication is better between more similar individuals(Robbins 1991) Thus homogeneous brand teams are also expected to havemore congruent perceptions because they are less likely to misunderstand eachother

Although communication within heterogeneous teams is typically moredifficult (Lichtenstein et al 1997 Zenger and Lawrence 1989) improving theircommunication will enable these teams to take advantage of the rich resourcesrepresented by their diversity For example greater frequency ofcommunication is likely to increase the similarity of their perceptions (Wagneret al 1984) The more frequently team members communicate with each otherthe more opportunities they will have to surface their perceptions regardingtheir brandrsquos identity and appreciate other membersrsquo perceptions Furthermorewhen conflicts are resolved co-operatively through individuals working out thedifferences between themselves more information is considered andintegrative solutions are likely to result rather than compromises (Maier 1967)Team members are also more likely to have favourable attitudes toward theoutcome (Ruekert and Walker (1987) We therefore propose

P12 The greater the similarities between members of the brand team themore informal and frequent the communication between them

Corporatebranding

451

P13 The more frequent the communication between members of the brandteam the greater the congruence between their perceptions about thenature of their brand

P14 The more stable the membership of the brand management team themore informal and frequent the communication between teammembers

Communication at the organisational level When all members of anorganisation understand their brandrsquos identity they are better able to act in amore coherent manner enhancing the likelihood of their activities supportingthe desired identity Maier (1967) maintained that many organisationalproblems could be attributed to inadequate communication between superiorsand their subordinates whose task it was to implement their decisionsCommunication between the brand team and employees will be crucial to theirperceptual congruity DelVecchio (1998) reported that greater interactionbetween managers and sales staff reduced their perceptual differences Wetherefore propose

P15 The more frequent the communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions about thenature of their brand

The nature as well as the frequency of communication is also expected toaffect the congruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsFisher et al (1997) reported that the bidirectionality of communication was asimportant as communication frequency in producing positive interfunctionaloutcomes Gilly and Woolfinbarger (1998) suggested that the congruence ofperceptions about an organisationrsquos advertisements was enhanced by two-waycommunication between management and employees Two-waycommunication provides the opportunity to assess how accurately thecommunication has been understood (Robbins 1991) Therefore we propose

P16 The greater the two-way communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions of their brand

The brand team needs to ensure that all forms of brand communicationspresent a coherent brand identity Employeesrsquo perceptions of their brand will bebased not only on what the brand team tells them but also on their ownexperience with the brand and brand advertisements Gilly and Woolfinbarger(1998) noted that consumer advertising was an important means ofcommunicating with employees and that consumer advertisements affected theway they perceived their service roles Employees were more accepting ofadvertisements when decision makers communicated with them about theadvertisements Hence the brand team should explain to employees not onlythe brandrsquos identity but also how other forms of brand communication areintended to reflect that identity Leaving such brand communications open to

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

452

interpretation is likely to increase incongruous brand perceptions amongemployees Hence we propose

P17 Explaining to employees how consumer advertisements are designedto communicate the corporate brand identity will increase thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsabout the nature of the brand

Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptionsWe now discuss mechanisms that can be used to help brand teams andemployees surface and harmonise their perceptions and develop congruentbrand perceptions

One approach is to use an independent facilitator (de Chernatony andDaniels 1994) The facilitator collates team membersrsquo anonymous individualbrand perceptions and then leads a workshop in which the range of perceptionsare discussed and a consensus reached regarding each of the brand identitycomponents This approach allows diverse views to be debated openly withthe facilitator ensuring they are each given due consideration The facilitatoras an impartial co-ordinator reduces the potential for conflict and preventsdomination of any team members Heterogeneous teams should find thisapproach particularly beneficial

Two techniques used in strategic decision making to assist the expressionand resolution of perceptions are dialectical inquiry (DI) and devilrsquos advocacy(DA) (Schweiger et al 1986) DI involves inducing maximal conflict byrequiring a team to debate two opposing views DA induces conflict throughthe consideration and critique of one view These techniques may be used byheterogeneous brand teams to legitimise and manage conflicting views aboutthe nature of the brand They should thus maximise the benefits of teamdiversity and result in greater consensus by allowing conflicting perceptions tobe expressed and resolved (cf Priem et al 1995) By forcing wider debate thesetechniques may also be used by homogeneous brand teams to counteract thepossibility of groupthink (Janis 1972)

A powerful device for creating a coherent focus among large numbers ofindividuals engaged in the development of a common concept was described byDumas (1994) in relation to design Dumas (1994) advocated the use of object-based metaphors called ` totemsrsquorsquo to build shared mental models Totems mayconsist of visual photographs or images and a set of words and provide agestalt that makes explicit the collective tacit knowledge of a team ofindividuals from a range of functional backgrounds Examples include ` tallboyrsquorsquo as a metaphor for the Honda ` Cityrsquorsquo (Clark and Fujimoto 1990) and ` rugbyplayer in a business suitrsquorsquo for the Honda ` Accordrsquorsquo (Nonaka 1991) AlthoughDumas (1994) described the use of totems by design teams developing newproducts the process may be used by brand teams as a simplifying andunifying device to reflect de Chernatonyrsquos (1999) six brand identitycomponents The brand team could then use a totem to help communicate abrandrsquos identity to employees and guide their behaviour accordingly

Corporatebranding

453

To gain employeesrsquo commitment to a brandrsquos identity it is important toestablish staff communication programmes Internal organisationalcommunication is crucial for providing and obtaining information achievingunderstanding and gaining employeesrsquo commitment (Gilly and Woolfinbarger1998) Employees need to know what is expected of them and how they cancontribute to the brandrsquos identity through their behaviour For example BUPARailtrack and Great North Eastern Railway have all introduced internalprogrammes to inform employees about their brand values and involve them inacting as ` ambassadorsrsquorsquo for their brands (Mistry 1998 Hemsley 1998 Wilson1998) Involvement facilitates understanding and consensus (Maier 1967Wooldridge and Floyd 1990) It is therefore important that employees areactively involved in the process of building a brandrsquos identity

Concluding remarksCorporate branding requires increased emphasis on internal brand resources topresent a coherent brand identity to stakeholders de Chernatonyrsquos (1999)identity-reputation gap model of brand management conceptualises brandbuilding as the process of narrowing the gap between brand identity and brandreputation Building on this we have identified key internal factors that wepropose affect the leverage of brand resources to enhance brand performanceEmployees play a crucial role in the brand building process and managers canfurther lever their brand potential by striving to achieve greater congruenceamong members of the brand team and between the team and other employeesIt is therefore crucial that corporate marketers adopt a planning perspectivewhich incorporates both internal pan-company marketing as well as thetraditional external perspective to ensure that there is synergy betweenemployeesrsquo actions resulting in optimising consumersrsquo satisfaction

Organisations also need to pay attention to the composition of their brandteams and be aware of their strengths and weaknesses The increasingheterogeneity of brand teams under corporate branding should enhance theresources of the brand team but will require greater emphasis on integration toarrive at congruent brand perceptions Organisations will need to considercarefully the appointment of new members to the brand team taking intoaccount the teamrsquos composition and whether new and existing members will beable to work together We have reviewed some of the mechanisms that may beused to assist the brand team in surfacing their perceptions and resolving anyinconsistencies Such mechanisms can help in the creation of a coherent brandidentity Organisations should then consider initiating internal programmes tocommunicate the brandrsquos identity to employees

We have recently embarked on empirical research to test our model of brandidentity and the internal factors we believe influence brand perceptions andperformance Our findings will be reported in future publications

References

Aaker JL (1997) ` Dimensions of brand personalityrsquorsquo Journal of Marketing Research Vol 34August pp 347-56

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

444

the brand Corporate culture can represent a source of competitive advantage(Bettencourt and Brown 1997) but the culture needs to be appropriateadaptive and attentive to the needs of all stakeholders (Kotter and Heskett1992) Managers thus need to agree on the few core corporate values that willremain unchanged and the less central values that need to adapt to changingcircumstances

PositioningThe coherence between the brandrsquos vision and core values and the brandrsquospositioning next needs to be examined A brandrsquos positioning sets out what thebrand is who it is for and what it offers (Rositer and Percy 1996) Followingmeans-end theory (Gutman 1982) a set of functionally distinct capabilities thatdifferentiate a brand should be derived from the brandrsquos core values Thebrandrsquos positioning will be affected by artefacts akin to Kapfererrsquos (1997)` physiquersquorsquo which provide cues about the brandrsquos performance characteristics

PersonalityThe brandrsquos emotional characteristics are represented by the metaphor ofpersonality which amongst other sources evolves from the brandrsquos corevalues Personality traits are further developed through associations with the` typical userrsquorsquo imagery endorsers and consumersrsquo contacts with the companyrsquosemployees (Aaker 1997) Managers therefore need to ensure that a brandrsquospersonality is conveyed consistently by both its employees and externalcommunications Another influential source for a brandrsquos personality is itspositioning and an integrated approach to branding can help reinforce thesynergy between these

RelationshipsHaving nurtured a brandrsquos personality a relationship between the brand andits consumers evolves which is characterised by the values inherent in thebrandrsquos personality Consistent with Fournier (1998) consumer-brandrelationships are portrayed as being reciprocal in Figure 1 Through theirinteractions employees significantly affect a brandrsquos relationship with itsconsumers The consistency of these interactions is therefore crucial sincerelationships continually evolve and can be destabilised by changes from eitherpartner (Fournier and Yao 1997) Managers need to help employees understandthe types of relationships that are appropriate with other employeesconsumers and other stakeholders based on the brandrsquos core values

PresentationThe final component of brand identity involves the identification ofpresentation styles to present the brandrsquos identity so as to reflect consumersrsquoaspirations (cf Kapfererrsquos (1997) ` reflectionsrsquorsquo) and self-images (Belk 1988Hogg and Mitchell 1996) People respond more favourably to brands andcompanies they perceive as being consistent with their self-concepts (Dowling

Corporatebranding

445

1994) Brandsrsquo symbolic meanings also help consumers understand andexpress aspects of their selves to others (McCracken 1993) Both advertisingand employeesrsquo interactions with consumers contribute to the symbolicmeaning of a brand Thus managers need to be attentive to potentialincongruity between a brandrsquos desired symbolic meanings and those conveyedthrough advertising and employeesrsquo behaviour

ReputationSuccessful management of internal brand resources should result in afavourable brand reputation Adapting Fombrun and Rindovarsquos (1996)definition of reputation a brandrsquos reputation is defined as ` a collectiverepresentation of a brandrsquos past actions and results that describes the brandrsquosability to deliver valued outcomes to multiple stakeholdersrsquorsquo In contrast to abrandrsquos image which reflects current changing perceptions a brandrsquosreputation is more stable and represents the distillation of multiple images overtime (Fombrun and van Riel 1997) By encompassing the evaluations of allstakeholders reputation provides a much more representative indication ofbrand performance van Riel and Balmer (1997) also noted that the objective ofcorporate identity management was the establishment of a favourablereputation among an organisationrsquos stakeholders Familiarity with keystakeholdersrsquo perceptions is central to corporate brand management (Balmer1995) de Chernatonyrsquos (1999) model conceptualises the brand building processas revolving around the identification and narrowing of gaps between abrandrsquos identity and its reputation Managers therefore need to work with staffto reduce these gaps and eliminate sources of incongruity Strategies may thenbe fine-tuned to achieve a better match between identity and reputation Byincluding both internal and external components in the process the modelprovides a balanced approach to brand building

Perceptual congruity and brand performancede Chernatonyrsquos (1999) model emphasises the multidimensional nature of thecorporate branding concept which involves the co-ordination of internalresources (for example functional capabilities communication capabilities co-ordinating consistency through staff planning pricing customer service) tocreate a coherent brand identity and a favourable brand reputation Althoughbrand reputation encompasses the perceptions of all stakeholder groups tobegin to appreciate the importance of internal brand resources we focus on twostakeholder groups an organisationrsquos employees and its consumers

Brands are multidimensional entities whose success requires matching afirmrsquos functional and emotional values with consumersrsquo performance andpsychosocial needs (de Chernatony and DallrsquoOlmo Riley 1998) Corporatebranding thus relies heavily on an organisationrsquos members holding congruentperceptions about the nature of their brand However with corporate brandingthe teams responsible for managing brands are becoming larger and thecomposition of their members more diverse We define a brand management

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

446

team as comprising those people responsible for designing and developing thebrand strategy This could include both internal staff (marketing customerservice corporate affairs etc) and those in external agencies working on thebrand The potential for misperceptions of a brand internally as well asexternally is therefore substantial

Perception depends on a personrsquos expectations and previous knowledge aswell as the information presented by the stimulus in this case the brand(Eysenck and Keane 1990) People at different seniority levels and fromdifferent departments tend to have differing information and decision criteria(Tjosvold 1987) Thus managers and employees are likely to differ in theirperceptions of their brandrsquos identity Indeed research has shown thatmanagersrsquo perceptions may differ from each other (de Chernatony et al 1993Reger 1990) Furthermore differences in managersrsquo functional backgroundscan result in selective perception and imperception (Beyer et al 1997)Managersrsquo perceptions have also been found to differ from those of sales staff(DelVecchio 1998) Congruent perceptions will therefore be crucial in thesuccessful management of corporate brands Specifically we propose

P1 There is a positive correlation between brand performance and thecongruence of the brand team membersrsquo perceptions about the nature oftheir brand

P2 There is a positive correlation between brand performance and thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and consumersrsquo perceptionsabout the nature of their brand

P3 There is a positive correlation between brand performance and thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptions aboutthe nature of their brand

Corporate branding involves multiple stakeholders interacting with numerousstaff across many departments in an organisation (Mitchell 1997) Effectivecorporate branding requires consistent messages about a brandrsquos identity anduniform delivery across all stakeholder groups to create a favourable brandreputation Internal consistency and congruency are vital to the successfulexternal communication of corporate identity (Abratt 1989) It is thereforeimportant that managers identify mechanisms for surfacing diverseperceptions to resolve inconsistencies Members of the brand team first need tosurface their own perceptions and clarify their brandrsquos intended identity Theyshould then work with employees to ensure their perceptions align with theintended brand identity As a further coherency check employees should beencouraged to provide feedback about how they believe consumers perceive thebrand

To build a coherent brand identity managers need to understand the factorsthat can affect the congruency of perceptions This will help them identifypotential problems and put in place appropriate mechanisms to minimiseincongruity We consider next the factors we believe affect the congruency of

Corporatebranding

447

perceptions within an organisation and how these influence brandperformance

Building the corporate brand through internal mechanismsA review of the literature (eg Tajfel and Fraser 1978 Wagner et al 1984 Murray1989 Smith et al 1994) suggested three key factors affect perceptual congruity thesimilarity of brand team members shared values and communication Figure 2shows how we believe these factors affect the congruency of perceptions and brandperformance The strength of this model is that it examines the effects of variousintervening variables on performance For example Carroll and Harrison (1998)could find only three studies that had examined intervening variables betweenorganisational demography and performance

In the following subsections we explore the impact of these internal factorsand examine the managerial implications of each

Similarity of brand team membersAs previously noted brand teams are larger with corporate branding and morediverse in their membership The resulting heterogeneity poses a challenge tothe formation of congruent perceptions which are crucial for effective leverageof brand resources and consequently brand performance The literature onteam composition typically defines similarity in terms of age experienceeducation team and organisations tenure and functional background (egBantel and Jackson 1989 Hambrick and Mason 1984 Smith et al 1994)Teams composed of members with dissimilar characteristics are likely to differwith respect to values (Bantel and Jackson 1989) and exhibit greater conflict(Murray 1989) Heterogeneous teams also tend to be associated with poorercommunication team integration and consensus building (Lichtenstein et al1997)

By contrast team members with similar characteristics are more likely tohave similar experiences and perspectives (Robbins 1991) shared values(Bantel and Jackson 1989) and communicate easily (Wagner et al 1984) For

Figure 2The relationships

between internal brandresources and brand

performance

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

448

example people who join an organisation at the same time are more likely toshare common experiences and have similar job values and orientations(Lichtenstein et al 1997) The sharing of common values results in betterconsensus (Erez 1992) Thus we postulate

P4 The greater the similarity of brand team members the more congruentwill be their perceptions about the nature of their brand

However the growing team heterogeneity with corporate branding does havesome benefits Heterogeneous teams offer a wider range of skills andknowledge and are less susceptible to the limitations of ` groupthinkrsquorsquo (Janis1972) Bantel and Jackson (1989) concluded that heterogeneity was beneficialfor tasks that involved complex problem solving and that heterogeneous teamswere more innovative In addition Murray (1989) suggested that heterogeneousgroups would be responsive to change Although heterogeneous teams areprone to conflict Priem et al (1995) argued that cognitive conflict that wasexpressed and resolved would produce stronger consensus than the prematureconsensus of teams that attempted to smooth over latent disagreement Thekey issue is thus whether heterogeneous brand teams can arrive at congruentbrand perceptions

Over time teams tend towards increasingly similar perceptions As teammembers work together the effects of surface-level (demographic) diversitydecrease (Harrison et al 1998) In addition conflict is reduced and groupcohesiveness grows as people interact and come to know each other better(Robbins 1991) Difficulties in communication should also recede over time ascommunication becomes easier between people used to working with eachother (Zenger and Lawrence 1989) Turnover is also higher among moredissimilar team members (Wagner et al 1984) Hence we postulate

P5 The longer the team tenure of heterogeneous brand teams the morecongruent will be their perceptions about the nature of their brand

However rather than leaving these tendencies to take effect over timeconstructive action should be taken to harness the strengths of heterogeneousteams while minimising the potential barriers to coherent management of abrandrsquos identity This is particularly important given that marketers tend tochange jobs frequently (Beyaztas 1998) We recommend that mechanisms beput in place to facilitate the surfacing and resolving of incongruent brandperceptions among brand team members Such mechanisms are discussed inthe section plusmn Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptions

Shared valuesPeople who share similar values tend to perceive things in similar ways(Meglino and Ravlin 1998) Deal and Kennedy (1982) argued that successfulorganisations placed great emphasis on making their values explicit andensuring they were known and shared by employees Top managementrsquos

Corporatebranding

449

values shape the perceptions and interpretations of an organisation (Hambrickand Mason 1984 GuilleAcircn 1994) Shared organisational values also provideemployees with guidance about desired behaviour (McDonald and Gantz1991) It is thus important with corporate branding that the brandrsquos and theorganisationrsquos values are consistent Shared values will play an important partin facilitating congruent brand perceptions and coherent actions both withinthe brand team and across the organisation They are also instrumental incommunicating the organisation to the outside world (Deal and Kennedy 1982)We therefore posit

P6 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the organisation and the values of the brand

Organisational performance is a function of its membersrsquo degree ofinvolvement and participation (Brown 1995) With corporate brandingorganisational and brand performance are closely entwined Erez (1992)reported that the sharing of common values resulted in greater consensus andcommitment to those values Thus we posit

P7 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe personal values of members of the brand team and the values of theorganisation

P8 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe personal values of employees and the values of the organisation

In addition to organisational values personal values also guide individualsrsquobehaviour (Rokeach 1973 Melgino and Ravlin 1998) Thus we expect thegreater the congruence between team membersrsquo and employeersquos personalvalues and those of the brand the more likely that managers and employeeswill act in accordance with the corporate brandrsquos values and the more coherentwill be the brandrsquos identity We therefore propose

P9 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the brand and the personal values of the brand team

P10 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the brand and the personal values of employees

However it is possible that an organisationrsquos shared values may beinappropriate for its continuing success (Deal and Kennedy 1982) Visionarycompanies nurture their core values and adapt to changing circumstanceswithout compromising them (Collins and Porras 1996) Kotter and Heskett(1992) proposed that values which helped organisations adapt were associatedwith sustained excellent performance Managers thus need to agree which aretheir core values that need to be sustained and which values should adapt ascircumstances change (de Chernatony 1999) Thus we postulate

P11 Strong shared organisational values that are appropriate and adaptivewill be positively associated with superior brand performance

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

450

CommunicationDubrin (1994 p 336) defined communication as

The sending receiving and understanding of messages It is also the basic process by whichmanagers and professionals accomplish their work The purpose of communication is togather process and disseminate information

Communication plays an important role in the formation of congruentperceptions (Gilly and Woolfinbarger 1998 Bowman and Ambrosini 1996)Furthermore Balmer (1995) suggested that an unfavourable image could resultfrom the mismanagement of communication We argue that communicationwill fulfil a vital role in surfacing perceptions and that effective communicationwill enable incongruent perceptions to be identified and resolved Tounderstand how communication will affect the congruence of perceptionsamong members of the brand team and between the brand team andemployees we examine communication at both the team and organisationallevels In the following subsections communication encompasses allcommunication among managers and staff in the course of their workactivities This includes both general communication and communicationspecifically relating to the corporate brand Our justification for focusing oncommunication as a whole is that the literature suggests that this affectsperceptual congruency (eg Wagner et al 1984 DelVecchio 1998) However aspart of our current empirical research we are in addition exploring the natureand effectiveness of specific communications about the corporate brand

Communication at the team level Communication is easier in teams whosemembers are similar to each other (Wagner et al 1984 Harrison et al 1998) orare used to working together (Zenger and Lawrence 1989) More importantlythe interpretation of communication is better between more similar individuals(Robbins 1991) Thus homogeneous brand teams are also expected to havemore congruent perceptions because they are less likely to misunderstand eachother

Although communication within heterogeneous teams is typically moredifficult (Lichtenstein et al 1997 Zenger and Lawrence 1989) improving theircommunication will enable these teams to take advantage of the rich resourcesrepresented by their diversity For example greater frequency ofcommunication is likely to increase the similarity of their perceptions (Wagneret al 1984) The more frequently team members communicate with each otherthe more opportunities they will have to surface their perceptions regardingtheir brandrsquos identity and appreciate other membersrsquo perceptions Furthermorewhen conflicts are resolved co-operatively through individuals working out thedifferences between themselves more information is considered andintegrative solutions are likely to result rather than compromises (Maier 1967)Team members are also more likely to have favourable attitudes toward theoutcome (Ruekert and Walker (1987) We therefore propose

P12 The greater the similarities between members of the brand team themore informal and frequent the communication between them

Corporatebranding

451

P13 The more frequent the communication between members of the brandteam the greater the congruence between their perceptions about thenature of their brand

P14 The more stable the membership of the brand management team themore informal and frequent the communication between teammembers

Communication at the organisational level When all members of anorganisation understand their brandrsquos identity they are better able to act in amore coherent manner enhancing the likelihood of their activities supportingthe desired identity Maier (1967) maintained that many organisationalproblems could be attributed to inadequate communication between superiorsand their subordinates whose task it was to implement their decisionsCommunication between the brand team and employees will be crucial to theirperceptual congruity DelVecchio (1998) reported that greater interactionbetween managers and sales staff reduced their perceptual differences Wetherefore propose

P15 The more frequent the communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions about thenature of their brand

The nature as well as the frequency of communication is also expected toaffect the congruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsFisher et al (1997) reported that the bidirectionality of communication was asimportant as communication frequency in producing positive interfunctionaloutcomes Gilly and Woolfinbarger (1998) suggested that the congruence ofperceptions about an organisationrsquos advertisements was enhanced by two-waycommunication between management and employees Two-waycommunication provides the opportunity to assess how accurately thecommunication has been understood (Robbins 1991) Therefore we propose

P16 The greater the two-way communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions of their brand

The brand team needs to ensure that all forms of brand communicationspresent a coherent brand identity Employeesrsquo perceptions of their brand will bebased not only on what the brand team tells them but also on their ownexperience with the brand and brand advertisements Gilly and Woolfinbarger(1998) noted that consumer advertising was an important means ofcommunicating with employees and that consumer advertisements affected theway they perceived their service roles Employees were more accepting ofadvertisements when decision makers communicated with them about theadvertisements Hence the brand team should explain to employees not onlythe brandrsquos identity but also how other forms of brand communication areintended to reflect that identity Leaving such brand communications open to

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

452

interpretation is likely to increase incongruous brand perceptions amongemployees Hence we propose

P17 Explaining to employees how consumer advertisements are designedto communicate the corporate brand identity will increase thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsabout the nature of the brand

Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptionsWe now discuss mechanisms that can be used to help brand teams andemployees surface and harmonise their perceptions and develop congruentbrand perceptions

One approach is to use an independent facilitator (de Chernatony andDaniels 1994) The facilitator collates team membersrsquo anonymous individualbrand perceptions and then leads a workshop in which the range of perceptionsare discussed and a consensus reached regarding each of the brand identitycomponents This approach allows diverse views to be debated openly withthe facilitator ensuring they are each given due consideration The facilitatoras an impartial co-ordinator reduces the potential for conflict and preventsdomination of any team members Heterogeneous teams should find thisapproach particularly beneficial

Two techniques used in strategic decision making to assist the expressionand resolution of perceptions are dialectical inquiry (DI) and devilrsquos advocacy(DA) (Schweiger et al 1986) DI involves inducing maximal conflict byrequiring a team to debate two opposing views DA induces conflict throughthe consideration and critique of one view These techniques may be used byheterogeneous brand teams to legitimise and manage conflicting views aboutthe nature of the brand They should thus maximise the benefits of teamdiversity and result in greater consensus by allowing conflicting perceptions tobe expressed and resolved (cf Priem et al 1995) By forcing wider debate thesetechniques may also be used by homogeneous brand teams to counteract thepossibility of groupthink (Janis 1972)

A powerful device for creating a coherent focus among large numbers ofindividuals engaged in the development of a common concept was described byDumas (1994) in relation to design Dumas (1994) advocated the use of object-based metaphors called ` totemsrsquorsquo to build shared mental models Totems mayconsist of visual photographs or images and a set of words and provide agestalt that makes explicit the collective tacit knowledge of a team ofindividuals from a range of functional backgrounds Examples include ` tallboyrsquorsquo as a metaphor for the Honda ` Cityrsquorsquo (Clark and Fujimoto 1990) and ` rugbyplayer in a business suitrsquorsquo for the Honda ` Accordrsquorsquo (Nonaka 1991) AlthoughDumas (1994) described the use of totems by design teams developing newproducts the process may be used by brand teams as a simplifying andunifying device to reflect de Chernatonyrsquos (1999) six brand identitycomponents The brand team could then use a totem to help communicate abrandrsquos identity to employees and guide their behaviour accordingly

Corporatebranding

453

To gain employeesrsquo commitment to a brandrsquos identity it is important toestablish staff communication programmes Internal organisationalcommunication is crucial for providing and obtaining information achievingunderstanding and gaining employeesrsquo commitment (Gilly and Woolfinbarger1998) Employees need to know what is expected of them and how they cancontribute to the brandrsquos identity through their behaviour For example BUPARailtrack and Great North Eastern Railway have all introduced internalprogrammes to inform employees about their brand values and involve them inacting as ` ambassadorsrsquorsquo for their brands (Mistry 1998 Hemsley 1998 Wilson1998) Involvement facilitates understanding and consensus (Maier 1967Wooldridge and Floyd 1990) It is therefore important that employees areactively involved in the process of building a brandrsquos identity

Concluding remarksCorporate branding requires increased emphasis on internal brand resources topresent a coherent brand identity to stakeholders de Chernatonyrsquos (1999)identity-reputation gap model of brand management conceptualises brandbuilding as the process of narrowing the gap between brand identity and brandreputation Building on this we have identified key internal factors that wepropose affect the leverage of brand resources to enhance brand performanceEmployees play a crucial role in the brand building process and managers canfurther lever their brand potential by striving to achieve greater congruenceamong members of the brand team and between the team and other employeesIt is therefore crucial that corporate marketers adopt a planning perspectivewhich incorporates both internal pan-company marketing as well as thetraditional external perspective to ensure that there is synergy betweenemployeesrsquo actions resulting in optimising consumersrsquo satisfaction

Organisations also need to pay attention to the composition of their brandteams and be aware of their strengths and weaknesses The increasingheterogeneity of brand teams under corporate branding should enhance theresources of the brand team but will require greater emphasis on integration toarrive at congruent brand perceptions Organisations will need to considercarefully the appointment of new members to the brand team taking intoaccount the teamrsquos composition and whether new and existing members will beable to work together We have reviewed some of the mechanisms that may beused to assist the brand team in surfacing their perceptions and resolving anyinconsistencies Such mechanisms can help in the creation of a coherent brandidentity Organisations should then consider initiating internal programmes tocommunicate the brandrsquos identity to employees

We have recently embarked on empirical research to test our model of brandidentity and the internal factors we believe influence brand perceptions andperformance Our findings will be reported in future publications

References

Aaker JL (1997) ` Dimensions of brand personalityrsquorsquo Journal of Marketing Research Vol 34August pp 347-56

Corporatebranding

445

1994) Brandsrsquo symbolic meanings also help consumers understand andexpress aspects of their selves to others (McCracken 1993) Both advertisingand employeesrsquo interactions with consumers contribute to the symbolicmeaning of a brand Thus managers need to be attentive to potentialincongruity between a brandrsquos desired symbolic meanings and those conveyedthrough advertising and employeesrsquo behaviour

ReputationSuccessful management of internal brand resources should result in afavourable brand reputation Adapting Fombrun and Rindovarsquos (1996)definition of reputation a brandrsquos reputation is defined as ` a collectiverepresentation of a brandrsquos past actions and results that describes the brandrsquosability to deliver valued outcomes to multiple stakeholdersrsquorsquo In contrast to abrandrsquos image which reflects current changing perceptions a brandrsquosreputation is more stable and represents the distillation of multiple images overtime (Fombrun and van Riel 1997) By encompassing the evaluations of allstakeholders reputation provides a much more representative indication ofbrand performance van Riel and Balmer (1997) also noted that the objective ofcorporate identity management was the establishment of a favourablereputation among an organisationrsquos stakeholders Familiarity with keystakeholdersrsquo perceptions is central to corporate brand management (Balmer1995) de Chernatonyrsquos (1999) model conceptualises the brand building processas revolving around the identification and narrowing of gaps between abrandrsquos identity and its reputation Managers therefore need to work with staffto reduce these gaps and eliminate sources of incongruity Strategies may thenbe fine-tuned to achieve a better match between identity and reputation Byincluding both internal and external components in the process the modelprovides a balanced approach to brand building

Perceptual congruity and brand performancede Chernatonyrsquos (1999) model emphasises the multidimensional nature of thecorporate branding concept which involves the co-ordination of internalresources (for example functional capabilities communication capabilities co-ordinating consistency through staff planning pricing customer service) tocreate a coherent brand identity and a favourable brand reputation Althoughbrand reputation encompasses the perceptions of all stakeholder groups tobegin to appreciate the importance of internal brand resources we focus on twostakeholder groups an organisationrsquos employees and its consumers

Brands are multidimensional entities whose success requires matching afirmrsquos functional and emotional values with consumersrsquo performance andpsychosocial needs (de Chernatony and DallrsquoOlmo Riley 1998) Corporatebranding thus relies heavily on an organisationrsquos members holding congruentperceptions about the nature of their brand However with corporate brandingthe teams responsible for managing brands are becoming larger and thecomposition of their members more diverse We define a brand management

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

446

team as comprising those people responsible for designing and developing thebrand strategy This could include both internal staff (marketing customerservice corporate affairs etc) and those in external agencies working on thebrand The potential for misperceptions of a brand internally as well asexternally is therefore substantial

Perception depends on a personrsquos expectations and previous knowledge aswell as the information presented by the stimulus in this case the brand(Eysenck and Keane 1990) People at different seniority levels and fromdifferent departments tend to have differing information and decision criteria(Tjosvold 1987) Thus managers and employees are likely to differ in theirperceptions of their brandrsquos identity Indeed research has shown thatmanagersrsquo perceptions may differ from each other (de Chernatony et al 1993Reger 1990) Furthermore differences in managersrsquo functional backgroundscan result in selective perception and imperception (Beyer et al 1997)Managersrsquo perceptions have also been found to differ from those of sales staff(DelVecchio 1998) Congruent perceptions will therefore be crucial in thesuccessful management of corporate brands Specifically we propose

P1 There is a positive correlation between brand performance and thecongruence of the brand team membersrsquo perceptions about the nature oftheir brand

P2 There is a positive correlation between brand performance and thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and consumersrsquo perceptionsabout the nature of their brand

P3 There is a positive correlation between brand performance and thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptions aboutthe nature of their brand

Corporate branding involves multiple stakeholders interacting with numerousstaff across many departments in an organisation (Mitchell 1997) Effectivecorporate branding requires consistent messages about a brandrsquos identity anduniform delivery across all stakeholder groups to create a favourable brandreputation Internal consistency and congruency are vital to the successfulexternal communication of corporate identity (Abratt 1989) It is thereforeimportant that managers identify mechanisms for surfacing diverseperceptions to resolve inconsistencies Members of the brand team first need tosurface their own perceptions and clarify their brandrsquos intended identity Theyshould then work with employees to ensure their perceptions align with theintended brand identity As a further coherency check employees should beencouraged to provide feedback about how they believe consumers perceive thebrand

To build a coherent brand identity managers need to understand the factorsthat can affect the congruency of perceptions This will help them identifypotential problems and put in place appropriate mechanisms to minimiseincongruity We consider next the factors we believe affect the congruency of

Corporatebranding

447

perceptions within an organisation and how these influence brandperformance

Building the corporate brand through internal mechanismsA review of the literature (eg Tajfel and Fraser 1978 Wagner et al 1984 Murray1989 Smith et al 1994) suggested three key factors affect perceptual congruity thesimilarity of brand team members shared values and communication Figure 2shows how we believe these factors affect the congruency of perceptions and brandperformance The strength of this model is that it examines the effects of variousintervening variables on performance For example Carroll and Harrison (1998)could find only three studies that had examined intervening variables betweenorganisational demography and performance

In the following subsections we explore the impact of these internal factorsand examine the managerial implications of each

Similarity of brand team membersAs previously noted brand teams are larger with corporate branding and morediverse in their membership The resulting heterogeneity poses a challenge tothe formation of congruent perceptions which are crucial for effective leverageof brand resources and consequently brand performance The literature onteam composition typically defines similarity in terms of age experienceeducation team and organisations tenure and functional background (egBantel and Jackson 1989 Hambrick and Mason 1984 Smith et al 1994)Teams composed of members with dissimilar characteristics are likely to differwith respect to values (Bantel and Jackson 1989) and exhibit greater conflict(Murray 1989) Heterogeneous teams also tend to be associated with poorercommunication team integration and consensus building (Lichtenstein et al1997)

By contrast team members with similar characteristics are more likely tohave similar experiences and perspectives (Robbins 1991) shared values(Bantel and Jackson 1989) and communicate easily (Wagner et al 1984) For

Figure 2The relationships

between internal brandresources and brand

performance

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

448

example people who join an organisation at the same time are more likely toshare common experiences and have similar job values and orientations(Lichtenstein et al 1997) The sharing of common values results in betterconsensus (Erez 1992) Thus we postulate

P4 The greater the similarity of brand team members the more congruentwill be their perceptions about the nature of their brand

However the growing team heterogeneity with corporate branding does havesome benefits Heterogeneous teams offer a wider range of skills andknowledge and are less susceptible to the limitations of ` groupthinkrsquorsquo (Janis1972) Bantel and Jackson (1989) concluded that heterogeneity was beneficialfor tasks that involved complex problem solving and that heterogeneous teamswere more innovative In addition Murray (1989) suggested that heterogeneousgroups would be responsive to change Although heterogeneous teams areprone to conflict Priem et al (1995) argued that cognitive conflict that wasexpressed and resolved would produce stronger consensus than the prematureconsensus of teams that attempted to smooth over latent disagreement Thekey issue is thus whether heterogeneous brand teams can arrive at congruentbrand perceptions

Over time teams tend towards increasingly similar perceptions As teammembers work together the effects of surface-level (demographic) diversitydecrease (Harrison et al 1998) In addition conflict is reduced and groupcohesiveness grows as people interact and come to know each other better(Robbins 1991) Difficulties in communication should also recede over time ascommunication becomes easier between people used to working with eachother (Zenger and Lawrence 1989) Turnover is also higher among moredissimilar team members (Wagner et al 1984) Hence we postulate

P5 The longer the team tenure of heterogeneous brand teams the morecongruent will be their perceptions about the nature of their brand

However rather than leaving these tendencies to take effect over timeconstructive action should be taken to harness the strengths of heterogeneousteams while minimising the potential barriers to coherent management of abrandrsquos identity This is particularly important given that marketers tend tochange jobs frequently (Beyaztas 1998) We recommend that mechanisms beput in place to facilitate the surfacing and resolving of incongruent brandperceptions among brand team members Such mechanisms are discussed inthe section plusmn Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptions

Shared valuesPeople who share similar values tend to perceive things in similar ways(Meglino and Ravlin 1998) Deal and Kennedy (1982) argued that successfulorganisations placed great emphasis on making their values explicit andensuring they were known and shared by employees Top managementrsquos

Corporatebranding

449

values shape the perceptions and interpretations of an organisation (Hambrickand Mason 1984 GuilleAcircn 1994) Shared organisational values also provideemployees with guidance about desired behaviour (McDonald and Gantz1991) It is thus important with corporate branding that the brandrsquos and theorganisationrsquos values are consistent Shared values will play an important partin facilitating congruent brand perceptions and coherent actions both withinthe brand team and across the organisation They are also instrumental incommunicating the organisation to the outside world (Deal and Kennedy 1982)We therefore posit

P6 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the organisation and the values of the brand

Organisational performance is a function of its membersrsquo degree ofinvolvement and participation (Brown 1995) With corporate brandingorganisational and brand performance are closely entwined Erez (1992)reported that the sharing of common values resulted in greater consensus andcommitment to those values Thus we posit

P7 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe personal values of members of the brand team and the values of theorganisation

P8 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe personal values of employees and the values of the organisation

In addition to organisational values personal values also guide individualsrsquobehaviour (Rokeach 1973 Melgino and Ravlin 1998) Thus we expect thegreater the congruence between team membersrsquo and employeersquos personalvalues and those of the brand the more likely that managers and employeeswill act in accordance with the corporate brandrsquos values and the more coherentwill be the brandrsquos identity We therefore propose

P9 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the brand and the personal values of the brand team

P10 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the brand and the personal values of employees

However it is possible that an organisationrsquos shared values may beinappropriate for its continuing success (Deal and Kennedy 1982) Visionarycompanies nurture their core values and adapt to changing circumstanceswithout compromising them (Collins and Porras 1996) Kotter and Heskett(1992) proposed that values which helped organisations adapt were associatedwith sustained excellent performance Managers thus need to agree which aretheir core values that need to be sustained and which values should adapt ascircumstances change (de Chernatony 1999) Thus we postulate

P11 Strong shared organisational values that are appropriate and adaptivewill be positively associated with superior brand performance

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

450

CommunicationDubrin (1994 p 336) defined communication as

The sending receiving and understanding of messages It is also the basic process by whichmanagers and professionals accomplish their work The purpose of communication is togather process and disseminate information

Communication plays an important role in the formation of congruentperceptions (Gilly and Woolfinbarger 1998 Bowman and Ambrosini 1996)Furthermore Balmer (1995) suggested that an unfavourable image could resultfrom the mismanagement of communication We argue that communicationwill fulfil a vital role in surfacing perceptions and that effective communicationwill enable incongruent perceptions to be identified and resolved Tounderstand how communication will affect the congruence of perceptionsamong members of the brand team and between the brand team andemployees we examine communication at both the team and organisationallevels In the following subsections communication encompasses allcommunication among managers and staff in the course of their workactivities This includes both general communication and communicationspecifically relating to the corporate brand Our justification for focusing oncommunication as a whole is that the literature suggests that this affectsperceptual congruency (eg Wagner et al 1984 DelVecchio 1998) However aspart of our current empirical research we are in addition exploring the natureand effectiveness of specific communications about the corporate brand

Communication at the team level Communication is easier in teams whosemembers are similar to each other (Wagner et al 1984 Harrison et al 1998) orare used to working together (Zenger and Lawrence 1989) More importantlythe interpretation of communication is better between more similar individuals(Robbins 1991) Thus homogeneous brand teams are also expected to havemore congruent perceptions because they are less likely to misunderstand eachother

Although communication within heterogeneous teams is typically moredifficult (Lichtenstein et al 1997 Zenger and Lawrence 1989) improving theircommunication will enable these teams to take advantage of the rich resourcesrepresented by their diversity For example greater frequency ofcommunication is likely to increase the similarity of their perceptions (Wagneret al 1984) The more frequently team members communicate with each otherthe more opportunities they will have to surface their perceptions regardingtheir brandrsquos identity and appreciate other membersrsquo perceptions Furthermorewhen conflicts are resolved co-operatively through individuals working out thedifferences between themselves more information is considered andintegrative solutions are likely to result rather than compromises (Maier 1967)Team members are also more likely to have favourable attitudes toward theoutcome (Ruekert and Walker (1987) We therefore propose

P12 The greater the similarities between members of the brand team themore informal and frequent the communication between them

Corporatebranding

451

P13 The more frequent the communication between members of the brandteam the greater the congruence between their perceptions about thenature of their brand

P14 The more stable the membership of the brand management team themore informal and frequent the communication between teammembers

Communication at the organisational level When all members of anorganisation understand their brandrsquos identity they are better able to act in amore coherent manner enhancing the likelihood of their activities supportingthe desired identity Maier (1967) maintained that many organisationalproblems could be attributed to inadequate communication between superiorsand their subordinates whose task it was to implement their decisionsCommunication between the brand team and employees will be crucial to theirperceptual congruity DelVecchio (1998) reported that greater interactionbetween managers and sales staff reduced their perceptual differences Wetherefore propose

P15 The more frequent the communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions about thenature of their brand

The nature as well as the frequency of communication is also expected toaffect the congruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsFisher et al (1997) reported that the bidirectionality of communication was asimportant as communication frequency in producing positive interfunctionaloutcomes Gilly and Woolfinbarger (1998) suggested that the congruence ofperceptions about an organisationrsquos advertisements was enhanced by two-waycommunication between management and employees Two-waycommunication provides the opportunity to assess how accurately thecommunication has been understood (Robbins 1991) Therefore we propose

P16 The greater the two-way communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions of their brand

The brand team needs to ensure that all forms of brand communicationspresent a coherent brand identity Employeesrsquo perceptions of their brand will bebased not only on what the brand team tells them but also on their ownexperience with the brand and brand advertisements Gilly and Woolfinbarger(1998) noted that consumer advertising was an important means ofcommunicating with employees and that consumer advertisements affected theway they perceived their service roles Employees were more accepting ofadvertisements when decision makers communicated with them about theadvertisements Hence the brand team should explain to employees not onlythe brandrsquos identity but also how other forms of brand communication areintended to reflect that identity Leaving such brand communications open to

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

452

interpretation is likely to increase incongruous brand perceptions amongemployees Hence we propose

P17 Explaining to employees how consumer advertisements are designedto communicate the corporate brand identity will increase thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsabout the nature of the brand

Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptionsWe now discuss mechanisms that can be used to help brand teams andemployees surface and harmonise their perceptions and develop congruentbrand perceptions

One approach is to use an independent facilitator (de Chernatony andDaniels 1994) The facilitator collates team membersrsquo anonymous individualbrand perceptions and then leads a workshop in which the range of perceptionsare discussed and a consensus reached regarding each of the brand identitycomponents This approach allows diverse views to be debated openly withthe facilitator ensuring they are each given due consideration The facilitatoras an impartial co-ordinator reduces the potential for conflict and preventsdomination of any team members Heterogeneous teams should find thisapproach particularly beneficial

Two techniques used in strategic decision making to assist the expressionand resolution of perceptions are dialectical inquiry (DI) and devilrsquos advocacy(DA) (Schweiger et al 1986) DI involves inducing maximal conflict byrequiring a team to debate two opposing views DA induces conflict throughthe consideration and critique of one view These techniques may be used byheterogeneous brand teams to legitimise and manage conflicting views aboutthe nature of the brand They should thus maximise the benefits of teamdiversity and result in greater consensus by allowing conflicting perceptions tobe expressed and resolved (cf Priem et al 1995) By forcing wider debate thesetechniques may also be used by homogeneous brand teams to counteract thepossibility of groupthink (Janis 1972)

A powerful device for creating a coherent focus among large numbers ofindividuals engaged in the development of a common concept was described byDumas (1994) in relation to design Dumas (1994) advocated the use of object-based metaphors called ` totemsrsquorsquo to build shared mental models Totems mayconsist of visual photographs or images and a set of words and provide agestalt that makes explicit the collective tacit knowledge of a team ofindividuals from a range of functional backgrounds Examples include ` tallboyrsquorsquo as a metaphor for the Honda ` Cityrsquorsquo (Clark and Fujimoto 1990) and ` rugbyplayer in a business suitrsquorsquo for the Honda ` Accordrsquorsquo (Nonaka 1991) AlthoughDumas (1994) described the use of totems by design teams developing newproducts the process may be used by brand teams as a simplifying andunifying device to reflect de Chernatonyrsquos (1999) six brand identitycomponents The brand team could then use a totem to help communicate abrandrsquos identity to employees and guide their behaviour accordingly

Corporatebranding

453

To gain employeesrsquo commitment to a brandrsquos identity it is important toestablish staff communication programmes Internal organisationalcommunication is crucial for providing and obtaining information achievingunderstanding and gaining employeesrsquo commitment (Gilly and Woolfinbarger1998) Employees need to know what is expected of them and how they cancontribute to the brandrsquos identity through their behaviour For example BUPARailtrack and Great North Eastern Railway have all introduced internalprogrammes to inform employees about their brand values and involve them inacting as ` ambassadorsrsquorsquo for their brands (Mistry 1998 Hemsley 1998 Wilson1998) Involvement facilitates understanding and consensus (Maier 1967Wooldridge and Floyd 1990) It is therefore important that employees areactively involved in the process of building a brandrsquos identity

Concluding remarksCorporate branding requires increased emphasis on internal brand resources topresent a coherent brand identity to stakeholders de Chernatonyrsquos (1999)identity-reputation gap model of brand management conceptualises brandbuilding as the process of narrowing the gap between brand identity and brandreputation Building on this we have identified key internal factors that wepropose affect the leverage of brand resources to enhance brand performanceEmployees play a crucial role in the brand building process and managers canfurther lever their brand potential by striving to achieve greater congruenceamong members of the brand team and between the team and other employeesIt is therefore crucial that corporate marketers adopt a planning perspectivewhich incorporates both internal pan-company marketing as well as thetraditional external perspective to ensure that there is synergy betweenemployeesrsquo actions resulting in optimising consumersrsquo satisfaction

Organisations also need to pay attention to the composition of their brandteams and be aware of their strengths and weaknesses The increasingheterogeneity of brand teams under corporate branding should enhance theresources of the brand team but will require greater emphasis on integration toarrive at congruent brand perceptions Organisations will need to considercarefully the appointment of new members to the brand team taking intoaccount the teamrsquos composition and whether new and existing members will beable to work together We have reviewed some of the mechanisms that may beused to assist the brand team in surfacing their perceptions and resolving anyinconsistencies Such mechanisms can help in the creation of a coherent brandidentity Organisations should then consider initiating internal programmes tocommunicate the brandrsquos identity to employees

We have recently embarked on empirical research to test our model of brandidentity and the internal factors we believe influence brand perceptions andperformance Our findings will be reported in future publications

References

Aaker JL (1997) ` Dimensions of brand personalityrsquorsquo Journal of Marketing Research Vol 34August pp 347-56

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

446

team as comprising those people responsible for designing and developing thebrand strategy This could include both internal staff (marketing customerservice corporate affairs etc) and those in external agencies working on thebrand The potential for misperceptions of a brand internally as well asexternally is therefore substantial

Perception depends on a personrsquos expectations and previous knowledge aswell as the information presented by the stimulus in this case the brand(Eysenck and Keane 1990) People at different seniority levels and fromdifferent departments tend to have differing information and decision criteria(Tjosvold 1987) Thus managers and employees are likely to differ in theirperceptions of their brandrsquos identity Indeed research has shown thatmanagersrsquo perceptions may differ from each other (de Chernatony et al 1993Reger 1990) Furthermore differences in managersrsquo functional backgroundscan result in selective perception and imperception (Beyer et al 1997)Managersrsquo perceptions have also been found to differ from those of sales staff(DelVecchio 1998) Congruent perceptions will therefore be crucial in thesuccessful management of corporate brands Specifically we propose

P1 There is a positive correlation between brand performance and thecongruence of the brand team membersrsquo perceptions about the nature oftheir brand

P2 There is a positive correlation between brand performance and thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and consumersrsquo perceptionsabout the nature of their brand

P3 There is a positive correlation between brand performance and thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptions aboutthe nature of their brand

Corporate branding involves multiple stakeholders interacting with numerousstaff across many departments in an organisation (Mitchell 1997) Effectivecorporate branding requires consistent messages about a brandrsquos identity anduniform delivery across all stakeholder groups to create a favourable brandreputation Internal consistency and congruency are vital to the successfulexternal communication of corporate identity (Abratt 1989) It is thereforeimportant that managers identify mechanisms for surfacing diverseperceptions to resolve inconsistencies Members of the brand team first need tosurface their own perceptions and clarify their brandrsquos intended identity Theyshould then work with employees to ensure their perceptions align with theintended brand identity As a further coherency check employees should beencouraged to provide feedback about how they believe consumers perceive thebrand

To build a coherent brand identity managers need to understand the factorsthat can affect the congruency of perceptions This will help them identifypotential problems and put in place appropriate mechanisms to minimiseincongruity We consider next the factors we believe affect the congruency of

Corporatebranding

447

perceptions within an organisation and how these influence brandperformance

Building the corporate brand through internal mechanismsA review of the literature (eg Tajfel and Fraser 1978 Wagner et al 1984 Murray1989 Smith et al 1994) suggested three key factors affect perceptual congruity thesimilarity of brand team members shared values and communication Figure 2shows how we believe these factors affect the congruency of perceptions and brandperformance The strength of this model is that it examines the effects of variousintervening variables on performance For example Carroll and Harrison (1998)could find only three studies that had examined intervening variables betweenorganisational demography and performance

In the following subsections we explore the impact of these internal factorsand examine the managerial implications of each

Similarity of brand team membersAs previously noted brand teams are larger with corporate branding and morediverse in their membership The resulting heterogeneity poses a challenge tothe formation of congruent perceptions which are crucial for effective leverageof brand resources and consequently brand performance The literature onteam composition typically defines similarity in terms of age experienceeducation team and organisations tenure and functional background (egBantel and Jackson 1989 Hambrick and Mason 1984 Smith et al 1994)Teams composed of members with dissimilar characteristics are likely to differwith respect to values (Bantel and Jackson 1989) and exhibit greater conflict(Murray 1989) Heterogeneous teams also tend to be associated with poorercommunication team integration and consensus building (Lichtenstein et al1997)

By contrast team members with similar characteristics are more likely tohave similar experiences and perspectives (Robbins 1991) shared values(Bantel and Jackson 1989) and communicate easily (Wagner et al 1984) For

Figure 2The relationships

between internal brandresources and brand

performance

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

448

example people who join an organisation at the same time are more likely toshare common experiences and have similar job values and orientations(Lichtenstein et al 1997) The sharing of common values results in betterconsensus (Erez 1992) Thus we postulate

P4 The greater the similarity of brand team members the more congruentwill be their perceptions about the nature of their brand

However the growing team heterogeneity with corporate branding does havesome benefits Heterogeneous teams offer a wider range of skills andknowledge and are less susceptible to the limitations of ` groupthinkrsquorsquo (Janis1972) Bantel and Jackson (1989) concluded that heterogeneity was beneficialfor tasks that involved complex problem solving and that heterogeneous teamswere more innovative In addition Murray (1989) suggested that heterogeneousgroups would be responsive to change Although heterogeneous teams areprone to conflict Priem et al (1995) argued that cognitive conflict that wasexpressed and resolved would produce stronger consensus than the prematureconsensus of teams that attempted to smooth over latent disagreement Thekey issue is thus whether heterogeneous brand teams can arrive at congruentbrand perceptions

Over time teams tend towards increasingly similar perceptions As teammembers work together the effects of surface-level (demographic) diversitydecrease (Harrison et al 1998) In addition conflict is reduced and groupcohesiveness grows as people interact and come to know each other better(Robbins 1991) Difficulties in communication should also recede over time ascommunication becomes easier between people used to working with eachother (Zenger and Lawrence 1989) Turnover is also higher among moredissimilar team members (Wagner et al 1984) Hence we postulate

P5 The longer the team tenure of heterogeneous brand teams the morecongruent will be their perceptions about the nature of their brand

However rather than leaving these tendencies to take effect over timeconstructive action should be taken to harness the strengths of heterogeneousteams while minimising the potential barriers to coherent management of abrandrsquos identity This is particularly important given that marketers tend tochange jobs frequently (Beyaztas 1998) We recommend that mechanisms beput in place to facilitate the surfacing and resolving of incongruent brandperceptions among brand team members Such mechanisms are discussed inthe section plusmn Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptions

Shared valuesPeople who share similar values tend to perceive things in similar ways(Meglino and Ravlin 1998) Deal and Kennedy (1982) argued that successfulorganisations placed great emphasis on making their values explicit andensuring they were known and shared by employees Top managementrsquos

Corporatebranding

449

values shape the perceptions and interpretations of an organisation (Hambrickand Mason 1984 GuilleAcircn 1994) Shared organisational values also provideemployees with guidance about desired behaviour (McDonald and Gantz1991) It is thus important with corporate branding that the brandrsquos and theorganisationrsquos values are consistent Shared values will play an important partin facilitating congruent brand perceptions and coherent actions both withinthe brand team and across the organisation They are also instrumental incommunicating the organisation to the outside world (Deal and Kennedy 1982)We therefore posit

P6 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the organisation and the values of the brand

Organisational performance is a function of its membersrsquo degree ofinvolvement and participation (Brown 1995) With corporate brandingorganisational and brand performance are closely entwined Erez (1992)reported that the sharing of common values resulted in greater consensus andcommitment to those values Thus we posit

P7 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe personal values of members of the brand team and the values of theorganisation

P8 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe personal values of employees and the values of the organisation

In addition to organisational values personal values also guide individualsrsquobehaviour (Rokeach 1973 Melgino and Ravlin 1998) Thus we expect thegreater the congruence between team membersrsquo and employeersquos personalvalues and those of the brand the more likely that managers and employeeswill act in accordance with the corporate brandrsquos values and the more coherentwill be the brandrsquos identity We therefore propose

P9 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the brand and the personal values of the brand team

P10 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the brand and the personal values of employees

However it is possible that an organisationrsquos shared values may beinappropriate for its continuing success (Deal and Kennedy 1982) Visionarycompanies nurture their core values and adapt to changing circumstanceswithout compromising them (Collins and Porras 1996) Kotter and Heskett(1992) proposed that values which helped organisations adapt were associatedwith sustained excellent performance Managers thus need to agree which aretheir core values that need to be sustained and which values should adapt ascircumstances change (de Chernatony 1999) Thus we postulate

P11 Strong shared organisational values that are appropriate and adaptivewill be positively associated with superior brand performance

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

450

CommunicationDubrin (1994 p 336) defined communication as

The sending receiving and understanding of messages It is also the basic process by whichmanagers and professionals accomplish their work The purpose of communication is togather process and disseminate information

Communication plays an important role in the formation of congruentperceptions (Gilly and Woolfinbarger 1998 Bowman and Ambrosini 1996)Furthermore Balmer (1995) suggested that an unfavourable image could resultfrom the mismanagement of communication We argue that communicationwill fulfil a vital role in surfacing perceptions and that effective communicationwill enable incongruent perceptions to be identified and resolved Tounderstand how communication will affect the congruence of perceptionsamong members of the brand team and between the brand team andemployees we examine communication at both the team and organisationallevels In the following subsections communication encompasses allcommunication among managers and staff in the course of their workactivities This includes both general communication and communicationspecifically relating to the corporate brand Our justification for focusing oncommunication as a whole is that the literature suggests that this affectsperceptual congruency (eg Wagner et al 1984 DelVecchio 1998) However aspart of our current empirical research we are in addition exploring the natureand effectiveness of specific communications about the corporate brand

Communication at the team level Communication is easier in teams whosemembers are similar to each other (Wagner et al 1984 Harrison et al 1998) orare used to working together (Zenger and Lawrence 1989) More importantlythe interpretation of communication is better between more similar individuals(Robbins 1991) Thus homogeneous brand teams are also expected to havemore congruent perceptions because they are less likely to misunderstand eachother

Although communication within heterogeneous teams is typically moredifficult (Lichtenstein et al 1997 Zenger and Lawrence 1989) improving theircommunication will enable these teams to take advantage of the rich resourcesrepresented by their diversity For example greater frequency ofcommunication is likely to increase the similarity of their perceptions (Wagneret al 1984) The more frequently team members communicate with each otherthe more opportunities they will have to surface their perceptions regardingtheir brandrsquos identity and appreciate other membersrsquo perceptions Furthermorewhen conflicts are resolved co-operatively through individuals working out thedifferences between themselves more information is considered andintegrative solutions are likely to result rather than compromises (Maier 1967)Team members are also more likely to have favourable attitudes toward theoutcome (Ruekert and Walker (1987) We therefore propose

P12 The greater the similarities between members of the brand team themore informal and frequent the communication between them

Corporatebranding

451

P13 The more frequent the communication between members of the brandteam the greater the congruence between their perceptions about thenature of their brand

P14 The more stable the membership of the brand management team themore informal and frequent the communication between teammembers

Communication at the organisational level When all members of anorganisation understand their brandrsquos identity they are better able to act in amore coherent manner enhancing the likelihood of their activities supportingthe desired identity Maier (1967) maintained that many organisationalproblems could be attributed to inadequate communication between superiorsand their subordinates whose task it was to implement their decisionsCommunication between the brand team and employees will be crucial to theirperceptual congruity DelVecchio (1998) reported that greater interactionbetween managers and sales staff reduced their perceptual differences Wetherefore propose

P15 The more frequent the communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions about thenature of their brand

The nature as well as the frequency of communication is also expected toaffect the congruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsFisher et al (1997) reported that the bidirectionality of communication was asimportant as communication frequency in producing positive interfunctionaloutcomes Gilly and Woolfinbarger (1998) suggested that the congruence ofperceptions about an organisationrsquos advertisements was enhanced by two-waycommunication between management and employees Two-waycommunication provides the opportunity to assess how accurately thecommunication has been understood (Robbins 1991) Therefore we propose

P16 The greater the two-way communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions of their brand

The brand team needs to ensure that all forms of brand communicationspresent a coherent brand identity Employeesrsquo perceptions of their brand will bebased not only on what the brand team tells them but also on their ownexperience with the brand and brand advertisements Gilly and Woolfinbarger(1998) noted that consumer advertising was an important means ofcommunicating with employees and that consumer advertisements affected theway they perceived their service roles Employees were more accepting ofadvertisements when decision makers communicated with them about theadvertisements Hence the brand team should explain to employees not onlythe brandrsquos identity but also how other forms of brand communication areintended to reflect that identity Leaving such brand communications open to

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

452

interpretation is likely to increase incongruous brand perceptions amongemployees Hence we propose

P17 Explaining to employees how consumer advertisements are designedto communicate the corporate brand identity will increase thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsabout the nature of the brand

Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptionsWe now discuss mechanisms that can be used to help brand teams andemployees surface and harmonise their perceptions and develop congruentbrand perceptions

One approach is to use an independent facilitator (de Chernatony andDaniels 1994) The facilitator collates team membersrsquo anonymous individualbrand perceptions and then leads a workshop in which the range of perceptionsare discussed and a consensus reached regarding each of the brand identitycomponents This approach allows diverse views to be debated openly withthe facilitator ensuring they are each given due consideration The facilitatoras an impartial co-ordinator reduces the potential for conflict and preventsdomination of any team members Heterogeneous teams should find thisapproach particularly beneficial

Two techniques used in strategic decision making to assist the expressionand resolution of perceptions are dialectical inquiry (DI) and devilrsquos advocacy(DA) (Schweiger et al 1986) DI involves inducing maximal conflict byrequiring a team to debate two opposing views DA induces conflict throughthe consideration and critique of one view These techniques may be used byheterogeneous brand teams to legitimise and manage conflicting views aboutthe nature of the brand They should thus maximise the benefits of teamdiversity and result in greater consensus by allowing conflicting perceptions tobe expressed and resolved (cf Priem et al 1995) By forcing wider debate thesetechniques may also be used by homogeneous brand teams to counteract thepossibility of groupthink (Janis 1972)

A powerful device for creating a coherent focus among large numbers ofindividuals engaged in the development of a common concept was described byDumas (1994) in relation to design Dumas (1994) advocated the use of object-based metaphors called ` totemsrsquorsquo to build shared mental models Totems mayconsist of visual photographs or images and a set of words and provide agestalt that makes explicit the collective tacit knowledge of a team ofindividuals from a range of functional backgrounds Examples include ` tallboyrsquorsquo as a metaphor for the Honda ` Cityrsquorsquo (Clark and Fujimoto 1990) and ` rugbyplayer in a business suitrsquorsquo for the Honda ` Accordrsquorsquo (Nonaka 1991) AlthoughDumas (1994) described the use of totems by design teams developing newproducts the process may be used by brand teams as a simplifying andunifying device to reflect de Chernatonyrsquos (1999) six brand identitycomponents The brand team could then use a totem to help communicate abrandrsquos identity to employees and guide their behaviour accordingly

Corporatebranding

453

To gain employeesrsquo commitment to a brandrsquos identity it is important toestablish staff communication programmes Internal organisationalcommunication is crucial for providing and obtaining information achievingunderstanding and gaining employeesrsquo commitment (Gilly and Woolfinbarger1998) Employees need to know what is expected of them and how they cancontribute to the brandrsquos identity through their behaviour For example BUPARailtrack and Great North Eastern Railway have all introduced internalprogrammes to inform employees about their brand values and involve them inacting as ` ambassadorsrsquorsquo for their brands (Mistry 1998 Hemsley 1998 Wilson1998) Involvement facilitates understanding and consensus (Maier 1967Wooldridge and Floyd 1990) It is therefore important that employees areactively involved in the process of building a brandrsquos identity

Concluding remarksCorporate branding requires increased emphasis on internal brand resources topresent a coherent brand identity to stakeholders de Chernatonyrsquos (1999)identity-reputation gap model of brand management conceptualises brandbuilding as the process of narrowing the gap between brand identity and brandreputation Building on this we have identified key internal factors that wepropose affect the leverage of brand resources to enhance brand performanceEmployees play a crucial role in the brand building process and managers canfurther lever their brand potential by striving to achieve greater congruenceamong members of the brand team and between the team and other employeesIt is therefore crucial that corporate marketers adopt a planning perspectivewhich incorporates both internal pan-company marketing as well as thetraditional external perspective to ensure that there is synergy betweenemployeesrsquo actions resulting in optimising consumersrsquo satisfaction

Organisations also need to pay attention to the composition of their brandteams and be aware of their strengths and weaknesses The increasingheterogeneity of brand teams under corporate branding should enhance theresources of the brand team but will require greater emphasis on integration toarrive at congruent brand perceptions Organisations will need to considercarefully the appointment of new members to the brand team taking intoaccount the teamrsquos composition and whether new and existing members will beable to work together We have reviewed some of the mechanisms that may beused to assist the brand team in surfacing their perceptions and resolving anyinconsistencies Such mechanisms can help in the creation of a coherent brandidentity Organisations should then consider initiating internal programmes tocommunicate the brandrsquos identity to employees

We have recently embarked on empirical research to test our model of brandidentity and the internal factors we believe influence brand perceptions andperformance Our findings will be reported in future publications

References

Aaker JL (1997) ` Dimensions of brand personalityrsquorsquo Journal of Marketing Research Vol 34August pp 347-56

Corporatebranding

447

perceptions within an organisation and how these influence brandperformance

Building the corporate brand through internal mechanismsA review of the literature (eg Tajfel and Fraser 1978 Wagner et al 1984 Murray1989 Smith et al 1994) suggested three key factors affect perceptual congruity thesimilarity of brand team members shared values and communication Figure 2shows how we believe these factors affect the congruency of perceptions and brandperformance The strength of this model is that it examines the effects of variousintervening variables on performance For example Carroll and Harrison (1998)could find only three studies that had examined intervening variables betweenorganisational demography and performance

In the following subsections we explore the impact of these internal factorsand examine the managerial implications of each

Similarity of brand team membersAs previously noted brand teams are larger with corporate branding and morediverse in their membership The resulting heterogeneity poses a challenge tothe formation of congruent perceptions which are crucial for effective leverageof brand resources and consequently brand performance The literature onteam composition typically defines similarity in terms of age experienceeducation team and organisations tenure and functional background (egBantel and Jackson 1989 Hambrick and Mason 1984 Smith et al 1994)Teams composed of members with dissimilar characteristics are likely to differwith respect to values (Bantel and Jackson 1989) and exhibit greater conflict(Murray 1989) Heterogeneous teams also tend to be associated with poorercommunication team integration and consensus building (Lichtenstein et al1997)

By contrast team members with similar characteristics are more likely tohave similar experiences and perspectives (Robbins 1991) shared values(Bantel and Jackson 1989) and communicate easily (Wagner et al 1984) For

Figure 2The relationships

between internal brandresources and brand

performance

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

448

example people who join an organisation at the same time are more likely toshare common experiences and have similar job values and orientations(Lichtenstein et al 1997) The sharing of common values results in betterconsensus (Erez 1992) Thus we postulate

P4 The greater the similarity of brand team members the more congruentwill be their perceptions about the nature of their brand

However the growing team heterogeneity with corporate branding does havesome benefits Heterogeneous teams offer a wider range of skills andknowledge and are less susceptible to the limitations of ` groupthinkrsquorsquo (Janis1972) Bantel and Jackson (1989) concluded that heterogeneity was beneficialfor tasks that involved complex problem solving and that heterogeneous teamswere more innovative In addition Murray (1989) suggested that heterogeneousgroups would be responsive to change Although heterogeneous teams areprone to conflict Priem et al (1995) argued that cognitive conflict that wasexpressed and resolved would produce stronger consensus than the prematureconsensus of teams that attempted to smooth over latent disagreement Thekey issue is thus whether heterogeneous brand teams can arrive at congruentbrand perceptions

Over time teams tend towards increasingly similar perceptions As teammembers work together the effects of surface-level (demographic) diversitydecrease (Harrison et al 1998) In addition conflict is reduced and groupcohesiveness grows as people interact and come to know each other better(Robbins 1991) Difficulties in communication should also recede over time ascommunication becomes easier between people used to working with eachother (Zenger and Lawrence 1989) Turnover is also higher among moredissimilar team members (Wagner et al 1984) Hence we postulate

P5 The longer the team tenure of heterogeneous brand teams the morecongruent will be their perceptions about the nature of their brand

However rather than leaving these tendencies to take effect over timeconstructive action should be taken to harness the strengths of heterogeneousteams while minimising the potential barriers to coherent management of abrandrsquos identity This is particularly important given that marketers tend tochange jobs frequently (Beyaztas 1998) We recommend that mechanisms beput in place to facilitate the surfacing and resolving of incongruent brandperceptions among brand team members Such mechanisms are discussed inthe section plusmn Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptions

Shared valuesPeople who share similar values tend to perceive things in similar ways(Meglino and Ravlin 1998) Deal and Kennedy (1982) argued that successfulorganisations placed great emphasis on making their values explicit andensuring they were known and shared by employees Top managementrsquos

Corporatebranding

449

values shape the perceptions and interpretations of an organisation (Hambrickand Mason 1984 GuilleAcircn 1994) Shared organisational values also provideemployees with guidance about desired behaviour (McDonald and Gantz1991) It is thus important with corporate branding that the brandrsquos and theorganisationrsquos values are consistent Shared values will play an important partin facilitating congruent brand perceptions and coherent actions both withinthe brand team and across the organisation They are also instrumental incommunicating the organisation to the outside world (Deal and Kennedy 1982)We therefore posit

P6 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the organisation and the values of the brand

Organisational performance is a function of its membersrsquo degree ofinvolvement and participation (Brown 1995) With corporate brandingorganisational and brand performance are closely entwined Erez (1992)reported that the sharing of common values resulted in greater consensus andcommitment to those values Thus we posit

P7 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe personal values of members of the brand team and the values of theorganisation

P8 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe personal values of employees and the values of the organisation

In addition to organisational values personal values also guide individualsrsquobehaviour (Rokeach 1973 Melgino and Ravlin 1998) Thus we expect thegreater the congruence between team membersrsquo and employeersquos personalvalues and those of the brand the more likely that managers and employeeswill act in accordance with the corporate brandrsquos values and the more coherentwill be the brandrsquos identity We therefore propose

P9 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the brand and the personal values of the brand team

P10 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the brand and the personal values of employees

However it is possible that an organisationrsquos shared values may beinappropriate for its continuing success (Deal and Kennedy 1982) Visionarycompanies nurture their core values and adapt to changing circumstanceswithout compromising them (Collins and Porras 1996) Kotter and Heskett(1992) proposed that values which helped organisations adapt were associatedwith sustained excellent performance Managers thus need to agree which aretheir core values that need to be sustained and which values should adapt ascircumstances change (de Chernatony 1999) Thus we postulate

P11 Strong shared organisational values that are appropriate and adaptivewill be positively associated with superior brand performance

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

450

CommunicationDubrin (1994 p 336) defined communication as

The sending receiving and understanding of messages It is also the basic process by whichmanagers and professionals accomplish their work The purpose of communication is togather process and disseminate information

Communication plays an important role in the formation of congruentperceptions (Gilly and Woolfinbarger 1998 Bowman and Ambrosini 1996)Furthermore Balmer (1995) suggested that an unfavourable image could resultfrom the mismanagement of communication We argue that communicationwill fulfil a vital role in surfacing perceptions and that effective communicationwill enable incongruent perceptions to be identified and resolved Tounderstand how communication will affect the congruence of perceptionsamong members of the brand team and between the brand team andemployees we examine communication at both the team and organisationallevels In the following subsections communication encompasses allcommunication among managers and staff in the course of their workactivities This includes both general communication and communicationspecifically relating to the corporate brand Our justification for focusing oncommunication as a whole is that the literature suggests that this affectsperceptual congruency (eg Wagner et al 1984 DelVecchio 1998) However aspart of our current empirical research we are in addition exploring the natureand effectiveness of specific communications about the corporate brand

Communication at the team level Communication is easier in teams whosemembers are similar to each other (Wagner et al 1984 Harrison et al 1998) orare used to working together (Zenger and Lawrence 1989) More importantlythe interpretation of communication is better between more similar individuals(Robbins 1991) Thus homogeneous brand teams are also expected to havemore congruent perceptions because they are less likely to misunderstand eachother

Although communication within heterogeneous teams is typically moredifficult (Lichtenstein et al 1997 Zenger and Lawrence 1989) improving theircommunication will enable these teams to take advantage of the rich resourcesrepresented by their diversity For example greater frequency ofcommunication is likely to increase the similarity of their perceptions (Wagneret al 1984) The more frequently team members communicate with each otherthe more opportunities they will have to surface their perceptions regardingtheir brandrsquos identity and appreciate other membersrsquo perceptions Furthermorewhen conflicts are resolved co-operatively through individuals working out thedifferences between themselves more information is considered andintegrative solutions are likely to result rather than compromises (Maier 1967)Team members are also more likely to have favourable attitudes toward theoutcome (Ruekert and Walker (1987) We therefore propose

P12 The greater the similarities between members of the brand team themore informal and frequent the communication between them

Corporatebranding

451

P13 The more frequent the communication between members of the brandteam the greater the congruence between their perceptions about thenature of their brand

P14 The more stable the membership of the brand management team themore informal and frequent the communication between teammembers

Communication at the organisational level When all members of anorganisation understand their brandrsquos identity they are better able to act in amore coherent manner enhancing the likelihood of their activities supportingthe desired identity Maier (1967) maintained that many organisationalproblems could be attributed to inadequate communication between superiorsand their subordinates whose task it was to implement their decisionsCommunication between the brand team and employees will be crucial to theirperceptual congruity DelVecchio (1998) reported that greater interactionbetween managers and sales staff reduced their perceptual differences Wetherefore propose

P15 The more frequent the communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions about thenature of their brand

The nature as well as the frequency of communication is also expected toaffect the congruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsFisher et al (1997) reported that the bidirectionality of communication was asimportant as communication frequency in producing positive interfunctionaloutcomes Gilly and Woolfinbarger (1998) suggested that the congruence ofperceptions about an organisationrsquos advertisements was enhanced by two-waycommunication between management and employees Two-waycommunication provides the opportunity to assess how accurately thecommunication has been understood (Robbins 1991) Therefore we propose

P16 The greater the two-way communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions of their brand

The brand team needs to ensure that all forms of brand communicationspresent a coherent brand identity Employeesrsquo perceptions of their brand will bebased not only on what the brand team tells them but also on their ownexperience with the brand and brand advertisements Gilly and Woolfinbarger(1998) noted that consumer advertising was an important means ofcommunicating with employees and that consumer advertisements affected theway they perceived their service roles Employees were more accepting ofadvertisements when decision makers communicated with them about theadvertisements Hence the brand team should explain to employees not onlythe brandrsquos identity but also how other forms of brand communication areintended to reflect that identity Leaving such brand communications open to

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

452

interpretation is likely to increase incongruous brand perceptions amongemployees Hence we propose

P17 Explaining to employees how consumer advertisements are designedto communicate the corporate brand identity will increase thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsabout the nature of the brand

Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptionsWe now discuss mechanisms that can be used to help brand teams andemployees surface and harmonise their perceptions and develop congruentbrand perceptions

One approach is to use an independent facilitator (de Chernatony andDaniels 1994) The facilitator collates team membersrsquo anonymous individualbrand perceptions and then leads a workshop in which the range of perceptionsare discussed and a consensus reached regarding each of the brand identitycomponents This approach allows diverse views to be debated openly withthe facilitator ensuring they are each given due consideration The facilitatoras an impartial co-ordinator reduces the potential for conflict and preventsdomination of any team members Heterogeneous teams should find thisapproach particularly beneficial

Two techniques used in strategic decision making to assist the expressionand resolution of perceptions are dialectical inquiry (DI) and devilrsquos advocacy(DA) (Schweiger et al 1986) DI involves inducing maximal conflict byrequiring a team to debate two opposing views DA induces conflict throughthe consideration and critique of one view These techniques may be used byheterogeneous brand teams to legitimise and manage conflicting views aboutthe nature of the brand They should thus maximise the benefits of teamdiversity and result in greater consensus by allowing conflicting perceptions tobe expressed and resolved (cf Priem et al 1995) By forcing wider debate thesetechniques may also be used by homogeneous brand teams to counteract thepossibility of groupthink (Janis 1972)

A powerful device for creating a coherent focus among large numbers ofindividuals engaged in the development of a common concept was described byDumas (1994) in relation to design Dumas (1994) advocated the use of object-based metaphors called ` totemsrsquorsquo to build shared mental models Totems mayconsist of visual photographs or images and a set of words and provide agestalt that makes explicit the collective tacit knowledge of a team ofindividuals from a range of functional backgrounds Examples include ` tallboyrsquorsquo as a metaphor for the Honda ` Cityrsquorsquo (Clark and Fujimoto 1990) and ` rugbyplayer in a business suitrsquorsquo for the Honda ` Accordrsquorsquo (Nonaka 1991) AlthoughDumas (1994) described the use of totems by design teams developing newproducts the process may be used by brand teams as a simplifying andunifying device to reflect de Chernatonyrsquos (1999) six brand identitycomponents The brand team could then use a totem to help communicate abrandrsquos identity to employees and guide their behaviour accordingly

Corporatebranding

453

To gain employeesrsquo commitment to a brandrsquos identity it is important toestablish staff communication programmes Internal organisationalcommunication is crucial for providing and obtaining information achievingunderstanding and gaining employeesrsquo commitment (Gilly and Woolfinbarger1998) Employees need to know what is expected of them and how they cancontribute to the brandrsquos identity through their behaviour For example BUPARailtrack and Great North Eastern Railway have all introduced internalprogrammes to inform employees about their brand values and involve them inacting as ` ambassadorsrsquorsquo for their brands (Mistry 1998 Hemsley 1998 Wilson1998) Involvement facilitates understanding and consensus (Maier 1967Wooldridge and Floyd 1990) It is therefore important that employees areactively involved in the process of building a brandrsquos identity

Concluding remarksCorporate branding requires increased emphasis on internal brand resources topresent a coherent brand identity to stakeholders de Chernatonyrsquos (1999)identity-reputation gap model of brand management conceptualises brandbuilding as the process of narrowing the gap between brand identity and brandreputation Building on this we have identified key internal factors that wepropose affect the leverage of brand resources to enhance brand performanceEmployees play a crucial role in the brand building process and managers canfurther lever their brand potential by striving to achieve greater congruenceamong members of the brand team and between the team and other employeesIt is therefore crucial that corporate marketers adopt a planning perspectivewhich incorporates both internal pan-company marketing as well as thetraditional external perspective to ensure that there is synergy betweenemployeesrsquo actions resulting in optimising consumersrsquo satisfaction

Organisations also need to pay attention to the composition of their brandteams and be aware of their strengths and weaknesses The increasingheterogeneity of brand teams under corporate branding should enhance theresources of the brand team but will require greater emphasis on integration toarrive at congruent brand perceptions Organisations will need to considercarefully the appointment of new members to the brand team taking intoaccount the teamrsquos composition and whether new and existing members will beable to work together We have reviewed some of the mechanisms that may beused to assist the brand team in surfacing their perceptions and resolving anyinconsistencies Such mechanisms can help in the creation of a coherent brandidentity Organisations should then consider initiating internal programmes tocommunicate the brandrsquos identity to employees

We have recently embarked on empirical research to test our model of brandidentity and the internal factors we believe influence brand perceptions andperformance Our findings will be reported in future publications

References

Aaker JL (1997) ` Dimensions of brand personalityrsquorsquo Journal of Marketing Research Vol 34August pp 347-56

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

448

example people who join an organisation at the same time are more likely toshare common experiences and have similar job values and orientations(Lichtenstein et al 1997) The sharing of common values results in betterconsensus (Erez 1992) Thus we postulate

P4 The greater the similarity of brand team members the more congruentwill be their perceptions about the nature of their brand

However the growing team heterogeneity with corporate branding does havesome benefits Heterogeneous teams offer a wider range of skills andknowledge and are less susceptible to the limitations of ` groupthinkrsquorsquo (Janis1972) Bantel and Jackson (1989) concluded that heterogeneity was beneficialfor tasks that involved complex problem solving and that heterogeneous teamswere more innovative In addition Murray (1989) suggested that heterogeneousgroups would be responsive to change Although heterogeneous teams areprone to conflict Priem et al (1995) argued that cognitive conflict that wasexpressed and resolved would produce stronger consensus than the prematureconsensus of teams that attempted to smooth over latent disagreement Thekey issue is thus whether heterogeneous brand teams can arrive at congruentbrand perceptions

Over time teams tend towards increasingly similar perceptions As teammembers work together the effects of surface-level (demographic) diversitydecrease (Harrison et al 1998) In addition conflict is reduced and groupcohesiveness grows as people interact and come to know each other better(Robbins 1991) Difficulties in communication should also recede over time ascommunication becomes easier between people used to working with eachother (Zenger and Lawrence 1989) Turnover is also higher among moredissimilar team members (Wagner et al 1984) Hence we postulate

P5 The longer the team tenure of heterogeneous brand teams the morecongruent will be their perceptions about the nature of their brand

However rather than leaving these tendencies to take effect over timeconstructive action should be taken to harness the strengths of heterogeneousteams while minimising the potential barriers to coherent management of abrandrsquos identity This is particularly important given that marketers tend tochange jobs frequently (Beyaztas 1998) We recommend that mechanisms beput in place to facilitate the surfacing and resolving of incongruent brandperceptions among brand team members Such mechanisms are discussed inthe section plusmn Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptions

Shared valuesPeople who share similar values tend to perceive things in similar ways(Meglino and Ravlin 1998) Deal and Kennedy (1982) argued that successfulorganisations placed great emphasis on making their values explicit andensuring they were known and shared by employees Top managementrsquos

Corporatebranding

449

values shape the perceptions and interpretations of an organisation (Hambrickand Mason 1984 GuilleAcircn 1994) Shared organisational values also provideemployees with guidance about desired behaviour (McDonald and Gantz1991) It is thus important with corporate branding that the brandrsquos and theorganisationrsquos values are consistent Shared values will play an important partin facilitating congruent brand perceptions and coherent actions both withinthe brand team and across the organisation They are also instrumental incommunicating the organisation to the outside world (Deal and Kennedy 1982)We therefore posit

P6 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the organisation and the values of the brand

Organisational performance is a function of its membersrsquo degree ofinvolvement and participation (Brown 1995) With corporate brandingorganisational and brand performance are closely entwined Erez (1992)reported that the sharing of common values resulted in greater consensus andcommitment to those values Thus we posit

P7 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe personal values of members of the brand team and the values of theorganisation

P8 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe personal values of employees and the values of the organisation

In addition to organisational values personal values also guide individualsrsquobehaviour (Rokeach 1973 Melgino and Ravlin 1998) Thus we expect thegreater the congruence between team membersrsquo and employeersquos personalvalues and those of the brand the more likely that managers and employeeswill act in accordance with the corporate brandrsquos values and the more coherentwill be the brandrsquos identity We therefore propose

P9 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the brand and the personal values of the brand team

P10 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the brand and the personal values of employees

However it is possible that an organisationrsquos shared values may beinappropriate for its continuing success (Deal and Kennedy 1982) Visionarycompanies nurture their core values and adapt to changing circumstanceswithout compromising them (Collins and Porras 1996) Kotter and Heskett(1992) proposed that values which helped organisations adapt were associatedwith sustained excellent performance Managers thus need to agree which aretheir core values that need to be sustained and which values should adapt ascircumstances change (de Chernatony 1999) Thus we postulate

P11 Strong shared organisational values that are appropriate and adaptivewill be positively associated with superior brand performance

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

450

CommunicationDubrin (1994 p 336) defined communication as

The sending receiving and understanding of messages It is also the basic process by whichmanagers and professionals accomplish their work The purpose of communication is togather process and disseminate information

Communication plays an important role in the formation of congruentperceptions (Gilly and Woolfinbarger 1998 Bowman and Ambrosini 1996)Furthermore Balmer (1995) suggested that an unfavourable image could resultfrom the mismanagement of communication We argue that communicationwill fulfil a vital role in surfacing perceptions and that effective communicationwill enable incongruent perceptions to be identified and resolved Tounderstand how communication will affect the congruence of perceptionsamong members of the brand team and between the brand team andemployees we examine communication at both the team and organisationallevels In the following subsections communication encompasses allcommunication among managers and staff in the course of their workactivities This includes both general communication and communicationspecifically relating to the corporate brand Our justification for focusing oncommunication as a whole is that the literature suggests that this affectsperceptual congruency (eg Wagner et al 1984 DelVecchio 1998) However aspart of our current empirical research we are in addition exploring the natureand effectiveness of specific communications about the corporate brand

Communication at the team level Communication is easier in teams whosemembers are similar to each other (Wagner et al 1984 Harrison et al 1998) orare used to working together (Zenger and Lawrence 1989) More importantlythe interpretation of communication is better between more similar individuals(Robbins 1991) Thus homogeneous brand teams are also expected to havemore congruent perceptions because they are less likely to misunderstand eachother

Although communication within heterogeneous teams is typically moredifficult (Lichtenstein et al 1997 Zenger and Lawrence 1989) improving theircommunication will enable these teams to take advantage of the rich resourcesrepresented by their diversity For example greater frequency ofcommunication is likely to increase the similarity of their perceptions (Wagneret al 1984) The more frequently team members communicate with each otherthe more opportunities they will have to surface their perceptions regardingtheir brandrsquos identity and appreciate other membersrsquo perceptions Furthermorewhen conflicts are resolved co-operatively through individuals working out thedifferences between themselves more information is considered andintegrative solutions are likely to result rather than compromises (Maier 1967)Team members are also more likely to have favourable attitudes toward theoutcome (Ruekert and Walker (1987) We therefore propose

P12 The greater the similarities between members of the brand team themore informal and frequent the communication between them

Corporatebranding

451

P13 The more frequent the communication between members of the brandteam the greater the congruence between their perceptions about thenature of their brand

P14 The more stable the membership of the brand management team themore informal and frequent the communication between teammembers

Communication at the organisational level When all members of anorganisation understand their brandrsquos identity they are better able to act in amore coherent manner enhancing the likelihood of their activities supportingthe desired identity Maier (1967) maintained that many organisationalproblems could be attributed to inadequate communication between superiorsand their subordinates whose task it was to implement their decisionsCommunication between the brand team and employees will be crucial to theirperceptual congruity DelVecchio (1998) reported that greater interactionbetween managers and sales staff reduced their perceptual differences Wetherefore propose

P15 The more frequent the communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions about thenature of their brand

The nature as well as the frequency of communication is also expected toaffect the congruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsFisher et al (1997) reported that the bidirectionality of communication was asimportant as communication frequency in producing positive interfunctionaloutcomes Gilly and Woolfinbarger (1998) suggested that the congruence ofperceptions about an organisationrsquos advertisements was enhanced by two-waycommunication between management and employees Two-waycommunication provides the opportunity to assess how accurately thecommunication has been understood (Robbins 1991) Therefore we propose

P16 The greater the two-way communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions of their brand

The brand team needs to ensure that all forms of brand communicationspresent a coherent brand identity Employeesrsquo perceptions of their brand will bebased not only on what the brand team tells them but also on their ownexperience with the brand and brand advertisements Gilly and Woolfinbarger(1998) noted that consumer advertising was an important means ofcommunicating with employees and that consumer advertisements affected theway they perceived their service roles Employees were more accepting ofadvertisements when decision makers communicated with them about theadvertisements Hence the brand team should explain to employees not onlythe brandrsquos identity but also how other forms of brand communication areintended to reflect that identity Leaving such brand communications open to

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

452

interpretation is likely to increase incongruous brand perceptions amongemployees Hence we propose

P17 Explaining to employees how consumer advertisements are designedto communicate the corporate brand identity will increase thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsabout the nature of the brand

Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptionsWe now discuss mechanisms that can be used to help brand teams andemployees surface and harmonise their perceptions and develop congruentbrand perceptions

One approach is to use an independent facilitator (de Chernatony andDaniels 1994) The facilitator collates team membersrsquo anonymous individualbrand perceptions and then leads a workshop in which the range of perceptionsare discussed and a consensus reached regarding each of the brand identitycomponents This approach allows diverse views to be debated openly withthe facilitator ensuring they are each given due consideration The facilitatoras an impartial co-ordinator reduces the potential for conflict and preventsdomination of any team members Heterogeneous teams should find thisapproach particularly beneficial

Two techniques used in strategic decision making to assist the expressionand resolution of perceptions are dialectical inquiry (DI) and devilrsquos advocacy(DA) (Schweiger et al 1986) DI involves inducing maximal conflict byrequiring a team to debate two opposing views DA induces conflict throughthe consideration and critique of one view These techniques may be used byheterogeneous brand teams to legitimise and manage conflicting views aboutthe nature of the brand They should thus maximise the benefits of teamdiversity and result in greater consensus by allowing conflicting perceptions tobe expressed and resolved (cf Priem et al 1995) By forcing wider debate thesetechniques may also be used by homogeneous brand teams to counteract thepossibility of groupthink (Janis 1972)

A powerful device for creating a coherent focus among large numbers ofindividuals engaged in the development of a common concept was described byDumas (1994) in relation to design Dumas (1994) advocated the use of object-based metaphors called ` totemsrsquorsquo to build shared mental models Totems mayconsist of visual photographs or images and a set of words and provide agestalt that makes explicit the collective tacit knowledge of a team ofindividuals from a range of functional backgrounds Examples include ` tallboyrsquorsquo as a metaphor for the Honda ` Cityrsquorsquo (Clark and Fujimoto 1990) and ` rugbyplayer in a business suitrsquorsquo for the Honda ` Accordrsquorsquo (Nonaka 1991) AlthoughDumas (1994) described the use of totems by design teams developing newproducts the process may be used by brand teams as a simplifying andunifying device to reflect de Chernatonyrsquos (1999) six brand identitycomponents The brand team could then use a totem to help communicate abrandrsquos identity to employees and guide their behaviour accordingly

Corporatebranding

453

To gain employeesrsquo commitment to a brandrsquos identity it is important toestablish staff communication programmes Internal organisationalcommunication is crucial for providing and obtaining information achievingunderstanding and gaining employeesrsquo commitment (Gilly and Woolfinbarger1998) Employees need to know what is expected of them and how they cancontribute to the brandrsquos identity through their behaviour For example BUPARailtrack and Great North Eastern Railway have all introduced internalprogrammes to inform employees about their brand values and involve them inacting as ` ambassadorsrsquorsquo for their brands (Mistry 1998 Hemsley 1998 Wilson1998) Involvement facilitates understanding and consensus (Maier 1967Wooldridge and Floyd 1990) It is therefore important that employees areactively involved in the process of building a brandrsquos identity

Concluding remarksCorporate branding requires increased emphasis on internal brand resources topresent a coherent brand identity to stakeholders de Chernatonyrsquos (1999)identity-reputation gap model of brand management conceptualises brandbuilding as the process of narrowing the gap between brand identity and brandreputation Building on this we have identified key internal factors that wepropose affect the leverage of brand resources to enhance brand performanceEmployees play a crucial role in the brand building process and managers canfurther lever their brand potential by striving to achieve greater congruenceamong members of the brand team and between the team and other employeesIt is therefore crucial that corporate marketers adopt a planning perspectivewhich incorporates both internal pan-company marketing as well as thetraditional external perspective to ensure that there is synergy betweenemployeesrsquo actions resulting in optimising consumersrsquo satisfaction

Organisations also need to pay attention to the composition of their brandteams and be aware of their strengths and weaknesses The increasingheterogeneity of brand teams under corporate branding should enhance theresources of the brand team but will require greater emphasis on integration toarrive at congruent brand perceptions Organisations will need to considercarefully the appointment of new members to the brand team taking intoaccount the teamrsquos composition and whether new and existing members will beable to work together We have reviewed some of the mechanisms that may beused to assist the brand team in surfacing their perceptions and resolving anyinconsistencies Such mechanisms can help in the creation of a coherent brandidentity Organisations should then consider initiating internal programmes tocommunicate the brandrsquos identity to employees

We have recently embarked on empirical research to test our model of brandidentity and the internal factors we believe influence brand perceptions andperformance Our findings will be reported in future publications

References

Aaker JL (1997) ` Dimensions of brand personalityrsquorsquo Journal of Marketing Research Vol 34August pp 347-56

Corporatebranding

449

values shape the perceptions and interpretations of an organisation (Hambrickand Mason 1984 GuilleAcircn 1994) Shared organisational values also provideemployees with guidance about desired behaviour (McDonald and Gantz1991) It is thus important with corporate branding that the brandrsquos and theorganisationrsquos values are consistent Shared values will play an important partin facilitating congruent brand perceptions and coherent actions both withinthe brand team and across the organisation They are also instrumental incommunicating the organisation to the outside world (Deal and Kennedy 1982)We therefore posit

P6 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the organisation and the values of the brand

Organisational performance is a function of its membersrsquo degree ofinvolvement and participation (Brown 1995) With corporate brandingorganisational and brand performance are closely entwined Erez (1992)reported that the sharing of common values resulted in greater consensus andcommitment to those values Thus we posit

P7 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe personal values of members of the brand team and the values of theorganisation

P8 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe personal values of employees and the values of the organisation

In addition to organisational values personal values also guide individualsrsquobehaviour (Rokeach 1973 Melgino and Ravlin 1998) Thus we expect thegreater the congruence between team membersrsquo and employeersquos personalvalues and those of the brand the more likely that managers and employeeswill act in accordance with the corporate brandrsquos values and the more coherentwill be the brandrsquos identity We therefore propose

P9 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the brand and the personal values of the brand team

P10 There is better brand performance as the congruence increases betweenthe values of the brand and the personal values of employees

However it is possible that an organisationrsquos shared values may beinappropriate for its continuing success (Deal and Kennedy 1982) Visionarycompanies nurture their core values and adapt to changing circumstanceswithout compromising them (Collins and Porras 1996) Kotter and Heskett(1992) proposed that values which helped organisations adapt were associatedwith sustained excellent performance Managers thus need to agree which aretheir core values that need to be sustained and which values should adapt ascircumstances change (de Chernatony 1999) Thus we postulate

P11 Strong shared organisational values that are appropriate and adaptivewill be positively associated with superior brand performance

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

450

CommunicationDubrin (1994 p 336) defined communication as

The sending receiving and understanding of messages It is also the basic process by whichmanagers and professionals accomplish their work The purpose of communication is togather process and disseminate information

Communication plays an important role in the formation of congruentperceptions (Gilly and Woolfinbarger 1998 Bowman and Ambrosini 1996)Furthermore Balmer (1995) suggested that an unfavourable image could resultfrom the mismanagement of communication We argue that communicationwill fulfil a vital role in surfacing perceptions and that effective communicationwill enable incongruent perceptions to be identified and resolved Tounderstand how communication will affect the congruence of perceptionsamong members of the brand team and between the brand team andemployees we examine communication at both the team and organisationallevels In the following subsections communication encompasses allcommunication among managers and staff in the course of their workactivities This includes both general communication and communicationspecifically relating to the corporate brand Our justification for focusing oncommunication as a whole is that the literature suggests that this affectsperceptual congruency (eg Wagner et al 1984 DelVecchio 1998) However aspart of our current empirical research we are in addition exploring the natureand effectiveness of specific communications about the corporate brand

Communication at the team level Communication is easier in teams whosemembers are similar to each other (Wagner et al 1984 Harrison et al 1998) orare used to working together (Zenger and Lawrence 1989) More importantlythe interpretation of communication is better between more similar individuals(Robbins 1991) Thus homogeneous brand teams are also expected to havemore congruent perceptions because they are less likely to misunderstand eachother

Although communication within heterogeneous teams is typically moredifficult (Lichtenstein et al 1997 Zenger and Lawrence 1989) improving theircommunication will enable these teams to take advantage of the rich resourcesrepresented by their diversity For example greater frequency ofcommunication is likely to increase the similarity of their perceptions (Wagneret al 1984) The more frequently team members communicate with each otherthe more opportunities they will have to surface their perceptions regardingtheir brandrsquos identity and appreciate other membersrsquo perceptions Furthermorewhen conflicts are resolved co-operatively through individuals working out thedifferences between themselves more information is considered andintegrative solutions are likely to result rather than compromises (Maier 1967)Team members are also more likely to have favourable attitudes toward theoutcome (Ruekert and Walker (1987) We therefore propose

P12 The greater the similarities between members of the brand team themore informal and frequent the communication between them

Corporatebranding

451

P13 The more frequent the communication between members of the brandteam the greater the congruence between their perceptions about thenature of their brand

P14 The more stable the membership of the brand management team themore informal and frequent the communication between teammembers

Communication at the organisational level When all members of anorganisation understand their brandrsquos identity they are better able to act in amore coherent manner enhancing the likelihood of their activities supportingthe desired identity Maier (1967) maintained that many organisationalproblems could be attributed to inadequate communication between superiorsand their subordinates whose task it was to implement their decisionsCommunication between the brand team and employees will be crucial to theirperceptual congruity DelVecchio (1998) reported that greater interactionbetween managers and sales staff reduced their perceptual differences Wetherefore propose

P15 The more frequent the communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions about thenature of their brand

The nature as well as the frequency of communication is also expected toaffect the congruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsFisher et al (1997) reported that the bidirectionality of communication was asimportant as communication frequency in producing positive interfunctionaloutcomes Gilly and Woolfinbarger (1998) suggested that the congruence ofperceptions about an organisationrsquos advertisements was enhanced by two-waycommunication between management and employees Two-waycommunication provides the opportunity to assess how accurately thecommunication has been understood (Robbins 1991) Therefore we propose

P16 The greater the two-way communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions of their brand

The brand team needs to ensure that all forms of brand communicationspresent a coherent brand identity Employeesrsquo perceptions of their brand will bebased not only on what the brand team tells them but also on their ownexperience with the brand and brand advertisements Gilly and Woolfinbarger(1998) noted that consumer advertising was an important means ofcommunicating with employees and that consumer advertisements affected theway they perceived their service roles Employees were more accepting ofadvertisements when decision makers communicated with them about theadvertisements Hence the brand team should explain to employees not onlythe brandrsquos identity but also how other forms of brand communication areintended to reflect that identity Leaving such brand communications open to

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

452

interpretation is likely to increase incongruous brand perceptions amongemployees Hence we propose

P17 Explaining to employees how consumer advertisements are designedto communicate the corporate brand identity will increase thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsabout the nature of the brand

Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptionsWe now discuss mechanisms that can be used to help brand teams andemployees surface and harmonise their perceptions and develop congruentbrand perceptions

One approach is to use an independent facilitator (de Chernatony andDaniels 1994) The facilitator collates team membersrsquo anonymous individualbrand perceptions and then leads a workshop in which the range of perceptionsare discussed and a consensus reached regarding each of the brand identitycomponents This approach allows diverse views to be debated openly withthe facilitator ensuring they are each given due consideration The facilitatoras an impartial co-ordinator reduces the potential for conflict and preventsdomination of any team members Heterogeneous teams should find thisapproach particularly beneficial

Two techniques used in strategic decision making to assist the expressionand resolution of perceptions are dialectical inquiry (DI) and devilrsquos advocacy(DA) (Schweiger et al 1986) DI involves inducing maximal conflict byrequiring a team to debate two opposing views DA induces conflict throughthe consideration and critique of one view These techniques may be used byheterogeneous brand teams to legitimise and manage conflicting views aboutthe nature of the brand They should thus maximise the benefits of teamdiversity and result in greater consensus by allowing conflicting perceptions tobe expressed and resolved (cf Priem et al 1995) By forcing wider debate thesetechniques may also be used by homogeneous brand teams to counteract thepossibility of groupthink (Janis 1972)

A powerful device for creating a coherent focus among large numbers ofindividuals engaged in the development of a common concept was described byDumas (1994) in relation to design Dumas (1994) advocated the use of object-based metaphors called ` totemsrsquorsquo to build shared mental models Totems mayconsist of visual photographs or images and a set of words and provide agestalt that makes explicit the collective tacit knowledge of a team ofindividuals from a range of functional backgrounds Examples include ` tallboyrsquorsquo as a metaphor for the Honda ` Cityrsquorsquo (Clark and Fujimoto 1990) and ` rugbyplayer in a business suitrsquorsquo for the Honda ` Accordrsquorsquo (Nonaka 1991) AlthoughDumas (1994) described the use of totems by design teams developing newproducts the process may be used by brand teams as a simplifying andunifying device to reflect de Chernatonyrsquos (1999) six brand identitycomponents The brand team could then use a totem to help communicate abrandrsquos identity to employees and guide their behaviour accordingly

Corporatebranding

453

To gain employeesrsquo commitment to a brandrsquos identity it is important toestablish staff communication programmes Internal organisationalcommunication is crucial for providing and obtaining information achievingunderstanding and gaining employeesrsquo commitment (Gilly and Woolfinbarger1998) Employees need to know what is expected of them and how they cancontribute to the brandrsquos identity through their behaviour For example BUPARailtrack and Great North Eastern Railway have all introduced internalprogrammes to inform employees about their brand values and involve them inacting as ` ambassadorsrsquorsquo for their brands (Mistry 1998 Hemsley 1998 Wilson1998) Involvement facilitates understanding and consensus (Maier 1967Wooldridge and Floyd 1990) It is therefore important that employees areactively involved in the process of building a brandrsquos identity

Concluding remarksCorporate branding requires increased emphasis on internal brand resources topresent a coherent brand identity to stakeholders de Chernatonyrsquos (1999)identity-reputation gap model of brand management conceptualises brandbuilding as the process of narrowing the gap between brand identity and brandreputation Building on this we have identified key internal factors that wepropose affect the leverage of brand resources to enhance brand performanceEmployees play a crucial role in the brand building process and managers canfurther lever their brand potential by striving to achieve greater congruenceamong members of the brand team and between the team and other employeesIt is therefore crucial that corporate marketers adopt a planning perspectivewhich incorporates both internal pan-company marketing as well as thetraditional external perspective to ensure that there is synergy betweenemployeesrsquo actions resulting in optimising consumersrsquo satisfaction

Organisations also need to pay attention to the composition of their brandteams and be aware of their strengths and weaknesses The increasingheterogeneity of brand teams under corporate branding should enhance theresources of the brand team but will require greater emphasis on integration toarrive at congruent brand perceptions Organisations will need to considercarefully the appointment of new members to the brand team taking intoaccount the teamrsquos composition and whether new and existing members will beable to work together We have reviewed some of the mechanisms that may beused to assist the brand team in surfacing their perceptions and resolving anyinconsistencies Such mechanisms can help in the creation of a coherent brandidentity Organisations should then consider initiating internal programmes tocommunicate the brandrsquos identity to employees

We have recently embarked on empirical research to test our model of brandidentity and the internal factors we believe influence brand perceptions andperformance Our findings will be reported in future publications

References

Aaker JL (1997) ` Dimensions of brand personalityrsquorsquo Journal of Marketing Research Vol 34August pp 347-56

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

450

CommunicationDubrin (1994 p 336) defined communication as

The sending receiving and understanding of messages It is also the basic process by whichmanagers and professionals accomplish their work The purpose of communication is togather process and disseminate information

Communication plays an important role in the formation of congruentperceptions (Gilly and Woolfinbarger 1998 Bowman and Ambrosini 1996)Furthermore Balmer (1995) suggested that an unfavourable image could resultfrom the mismanagement of communication We argue that communicationwill fulfil a vital role in surfacing perceptions and that effective communicationwill enable incongruent perceptions to be identified and resolved Tounderstand how communication will affect the congruence of perceptionsamong members of the brand team and between the brand team andemployees we examine communication at both the team and organisationallevels In the following subsections communication encompasses allcommunication among managers and staff in the course of their workactivities This includes both general communication and communicationspecifically relating to the corporate brand Our justification for focusing oncommunication as a whole is that the literature suggests that this affectsperceptual congruency (eg Wagner et al 1984 DelVecchio 1998) However aspart of our current empirical research we are in addition exploring the natureand effectiveness of specific communications about the corporate brand

Communication at the team level Communication is easier in teams whosemembers are similar to each other (Wagner et al 1984 Harrison et al 1998) orare used to working together (Zenger and Lawrence 1989) More importantlythe interpretation of communication is better between more similar individuals(Robbins 1991) Thus homogeneous brand teams are also expected to havemore congruent perceptions because they are less likely to misunderstand eachother

Although communication within heterogeneous teams is typically moredifficult (Lichtenstein et al 1997 Zenger and Lawrence 1989) improving theircommunication will enable these teams to take advantage of the rich resourcesrepresented by their diversity For example greater frequency ofcommunication is likely to increase the similarity of their perceptions (Wagneret al 1984) The more frequently team members communicate with each otherthe more opportunities they will have to surface their perceptions regardingtheir brandrsquos identity and appreciate other membersrsquo perceptions Furthermorewhen conflicts are resolved co-operatively through individuals working out thedifferences between themselves more information is considered andintegrative solutions are likely to result rather than compromises (Maier 1967)Team members are also more likely to have favourable attitudes toward theoutcome (Ruekert and Walker (1987) We therefore propose

P12 The greater the similarities between members of the brand team themore informal and frequent the communication between them

Corporatebranding

451

P13 The more frequent the communication between members of the brandteam the greater the congruence between their perceptions about thenature of their brand

P14 The more stable the membership of the brand management team themore informal and frequent the communication between teammembers

Communication at the organisational level When all members of anorganisation understand their brandrsquos identity they are better able to act in amore coherent manner enhancing the likelihood of their activities supportingthe desired identity Maier (1967) maintained that many organisationalproblems could be attributed to inadequate communication between superiorsand their subordinates whose task it was to implement their decisionsCommunication between the brand team and employees will be crucial to theirperceptual congruity DelVecchio (1998) reported that greater interactionbetween managers and sales staff reduced their perceptual differences Wetherefore propose

P15 The more frequent the communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions about thenature of their brand

The nature as well as the frequency of communication is also expected toaffect the congruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsFisher et al (1997) reported that the bidirectionality of communication was asimportant as communication frequency in producing positive interfunctionaloutcomes Gilly and Woolfinbarger (1998) suggested that the congruence ofperceptions about an organisationrsquos advertisements was enhanced by two-waycommunication between management and employees Two-waycommunication provides the opportunity to assess how accurately thecommunication has been understood (Robbins 1991) Therefore we propose

P16 The greater the two-way communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions of their brand

The brand team needs to ensure that all forms of brand communicationspresent a coherent brand identity Employeesrsquo perceptions of their brand will bebased not only on what the brand team tells them but also on their ownexperience with the brand and brand advertisements Gilly and Woolfinbarger(1998) noted that consumer advertising was an important means ofcommunicating with employees and that consumer advertisements affected theway they perceived their service roles Employees were more accepting ofadvertisements when decision makers communicated with them about theadvertisements Hence the brand team should explain to employees not onlythe brandrsquos identity but also how other forms of brand communication areintended to reflect that identity Leaving such brand communications open to

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

452

interpretation is likely to increase incongruous brand perceptions amongemployees Hence we propose

P17 Explaining to employees how consumer advertisements are designedto communicate the corporate brand identity will increase thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsabout the nature of the brand

Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptionsWe now discuss mechanisms that can be used to help brand teams andemployees surface and harmonise their perceptions and develop congruentbrand perceptions

One approach is to use an independent facilitator (de Chernatony andDaniels 1994) The facilitator collates team membersrsquo anonymous individualbrand perceptions and then leads a workshop in which the range of perceptionsare discussed and a consensus reached regarding each of the brand identitycomponents This approach allows diverse views to be debated openly withthe facilitator ensuring they are each given due consideration The facilitatoras an impartial co-ordinator reduces the potential for conflict and preventsdomination of any team members Heterogeneous teams should find thisapproach particularly beneficial

Two techniques used in strategic decision making to assist the expressionand resolution of perceptions are dialectical inquiry (DI) and devilrsquos advocacy(DA) (Schweiger et al 1986) DI involves inducing maximal conflict byrequiring a team to debate two opposing views DA induces conflict throughthe consideration and critique of one view These techniques may be used byheterogeneous brand teams to legitimise and manage conflicting views aboutthe nature of the brand They should thus maximise the benefits of teamdiversity and result in greater consensus by allowing conflicting perceptions tobe expressed and resolved (cf Priem et al 1995) By forcing wider debate thesetechniques may also be used by homogeneous brand teams to counteract thepossibility of groupthink (Janis 1972)

A powerful device for creating a coherent focus among large numbers ofindividuals engaged in the development of a common concept was described byDumas (1994) in relation to design Dumas (1994) advocated the use of object-based metaphors called ` totemsrsquorsquo to build shared mental models Totems mayconsist of visual photographs or images and a set of words and provide agestalt that makes explicit the collective tacit knowledge of a team ofindividuals from a range of functional backgrounds Examples include ` tallboyrsquorsquo as a metaphor for the Honda ` Cityrsquorsquo (Clark and Fujimoto 1990) and ` rugbyplayer in a business suitrsquorsquo for the Honda ` Accordrsquorsquo (Nonaka 1991) AlthoughDumas (1994) described the use of totems by design teams developing newproducts the process may be used by brand teams as a simplifying andunifying device to reflect de Chernatonyrsquos (1999) six brand identitycomponents The brand team could then use a totem to help communicate abrandrsquos identity to employees and guide their behaviour accordingly

Corporatebranding

453

To gain employeesrsquo commitment to a brandrsquos identity it is important toestablish staff communication programmes Internal organisationalcommunication is crucial for providing and obtaining information achievingunderstanding and gaining employeesrsquo commitment (Gilly and Woolfinbarger1998) Employees need to know what is expected of them and how they cancontribute to the brandrsquos identity through their behaviour For example BUPARailtrack and Great North Eastern Railway have all introduced internalprogrammes to inform employees about their brand values and involve them inacting as ` ambassadorsrsquorsquo for their brands (Mistry 1998 Hemsley 1998 Wilson1998) Involvement facilitates understanding and consensus (Maier 1967Wooldridge and Floyd 1990) It is therefore important that employees areactively involved in the process of building a brandrsquos identity

Concluding remarksCorporate branding requires increased emphasis on internal brand resources topresent a coherent brand identity to stakeholders de Chernatonyrsquos (1999)identity-reputation gap model of brand management conceptualises brandbuilding as the process of narrowing the gap between brand identity and brandreputation Building on this we have identified key internal factors that wepropose affect the leverage of brand resources to enhance brand performanceEmployees play a crucial role in the brand building process and managers canfurther lever their brand potential by striving to achieve greater congruenceamong members of the brand team and between the team and other employeesIt is therefore crucial that corporate marketers adopt a planning perspectivewhich incorporates both internal pan-company marketing as well as thetraditional external perspective to ensure that there is synergy betweenemployeesrsquo actions resulting in optimising consumersrsquo satisfaction

Organisations also need to pay attention to the composition of their brandteams and be aware of their strengths and weaknesses The increasingheterogeneity of brand teams under corporate branding should enhance theresources of the brand team but will require greater emphasis on integration toarrive at congruent brand perceptions Organisations will need to considercarefully the appointment of new members to the brand team taking intoaccount the teamrsquos composition and whether new and existing members will beable to work together We have reviewed some of the mechanisms that may beused to assist the brand team in surfacing their perceptions and resolving anyinconsistencies Such mechanisms can help in the creation of a coherent brandidentity Organisations should then consider initiating internal programmes tocommunicate the brandrsquos identity to employees

We have recently embarked on empirical research to test our model of brandidentity and the internal factors we believe influence brand perceptions andperformance Our findings will be reported in future publications

References

Aaker JL (1997) ` Dimensions of brand personalityrsquorsquo Journal of Marketing Research Vol 34August pp 347-56

Corporatebranding

451

P13 The more frequent the communication between members of the brandteam the greater the congruence between their perceptions about thenature of their brand

P14 The more stable the membership of the brand management team themore informal and frequent the communication between teammembers

Communication at the organisational level When all members of anorganisation understand their brandrsquos identity they are better able to act in amore coherent manner enhancing the likelihood of their activities supportingthe desired identity Maier (1967) maintained that many organisationalproblems could be attributed to inadequate communication between superiorsand their subordinates whose task it was to implement their decisionsCommunication between the brand team and employees will be crucial to theirperceptual congruity DelVecchio (1998) reported that greater interactionbetween managers and sales staff reduced their perceptual differences Wetherefore propose

P15 The more frequent the communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions about thenature of their brand

The nature as well as the frequency of communication is also expected toaffect the congruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsFisher et al (1997) reported that the bidirectionality of communication was asimportant as communication frequency in producing positive interfunctionaloutcomes Gilly and Woolfinbarger (1998) suggested that the congruence ofperceptions about an organisationrsquos advertisements was enhanced by two-waycommunication between management and employees Two-waycommunication provides the opportunity to assess how accurately thecommunication has been understood (Robbins 1991) Therefore we propose

P16 The greater the two-way communication between the brand team andemployees the more congruent will be their perceptions of their brand

The brand team needs to ensure that all forms of brand communicationspresent a coherent brand identity Employeesrsquo perceptions of their brand will bebased not only on what the brand team tells them but also on their ownexperience with the brand and brand advertisements Gilly and Woolfinbarger(1998) noted that consumer advertising was an important means ofcommunicating with employees and that consumer advertisements affected theway they perceived their service roles Employees were more accepting ofadvertisements when decision makers communicated with them about theadvertisements Hence the brand team should explain to employees not onlythe brandrsquos identity but also how other forms of brand communication areintended to reflect that identity Leaving such brand communications open to

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

452

interpretation is likely to increase incongruous brand perceptions amongemployees Hence we propose

P17 Explaining to employees how consumer advertisements are designedto communicate the corporate brand identity will increase thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsabout the nature of the brand

Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptionsWe now discuss mechanisms that can be used to help brand teams andemployees surface and harmonise their perceptions and develop congruentbrand perceptions

One approach is to use an independent facilitator (de Chernatony andDaniels 1994) The facilitator collates team membersrsquo anonymous individualbrand perceptions and then leads a workshop in which the range of perceptionsare discussed and a consensus reached regarding each of the brand identitycomponents This approach allows diverse views to be debated openly withthe facilitator ensuring they are each given due consideration The facilitatoras an impartial co-ordinator reduces the potential for conflict and preventsdomination of any team members Heterogeneous teams should find thisapproach particularly beneficial

Two techniques used in strategic decision making to assist the expressionand resolution of perceptions are dialectical inquiry (DI) and devilrsquos advocacy(DA) (Schweiger et al 1986) DI involves inducing maximal conflict byrequiring a team to debate two opposing views DA induces conflict throughthe consideration and critique of one view These techniques may be used byheterogeneous brand teams to legitimise and manage conflicting views aboutthe nature of the brand They should thus maximise the benefits of teamdiversity and result in greater consensus by allowing conflicting perceptions tobe expressed and resolved (cf Priem et al 1995) By forcing wider debate thesetechniques may also be used by homogeneous brand teams to counteract thepossibility of groupthink (Janis 1972)

A powerful device for creating a coherent focus among large numbers ofindividuals engaged in the development of a common concept was described byDumas (1994) in relation to design Dumas (1994) advocated the use of object-based metaphors called ` totemsrsquorsquo to build shared mental models Totems mayconsist of visual photographs or images and a set of words and provide agestalt that makes explicit the collective tacit knowledge of a team ofindividuals from a range of functional backgrounds Examples include ` tallboyrsquorsquo as a metaphor for the Honda ` Cityrsquorsquo (Clark and Fujimoto 1990) and ` rugbyplayer in a business suitrsquorsquo for the Honda ` Accordrsquorsquo (Nonaka 1991) AlthoughDumas (1994) described the use of totems by design teams developing newproducts the process may be used by brand teams as a simplifying andunifying device to reflect de Chernatonyrsquos (1999) six brand identitycomponents The brand team could then use a totem to help communicate abrandrsquos identity to employees and guide their behaviour accordingly

Corporatebranding

453

To gain employeesrsquo commitment to a brandrsquos identity it is important toestablish staff communication programmes Internal organisationalcommunication is crucial for providing and obtaining information achievingunderstanding and gaining employeesrsquo commitment (Gilly and Woolfinbarger1998) Employees need to know what is expected of them and how they cancontribute to the brandrsquos identity through their behaviour For example BUPARailtrack and Great North Eastern Railway have all introduced internalprogrammes to inform employees about their brand values and involve them inacting as ` ambassadorsrsquorsquo for their brands (Mistry 1998 Hemsley 1998 Wilson1998) Involvement facilitates understanding and consensus (Maier 1967Wooldridge and Floyd 1990) It is therefore important that employees areactively involved in the process of building a brandrsquos identity

Concluding remarksCorporate branding requires increased emphasis on internal brand resources topresent a coherent brand identity to stakeholders de Chernatonyrsquos (1999)identity-reputation gap model of brand management conceptualises brandbuilding as the process of narrowing the gap between brand identity and brandreputation Building on this we have identified key internal factors that wepropose affect the leverage of brand resources to enhance brand performanceEmployees play a crucial role in the brand building process and managers canfurther lever their brand potential by striving to achieve greater congruenceamong members of the brand team and between the team and other employeesIt is therefore crucial that corporate marketers adopt a planning perspectivewhich incorporates both internal pan-company marketing as well as thetraditional external perspective to ensure that there is synergy betweenemployeesrsquo actions resulting in optimising consumersrsquo satisfaction

Organisations also need to pay attention to the composition of their brandteams and be aware of their strengths and weaknesses The increasingheterogeneity of brand teams under corporate branding should enhance theresources of the brand team but will require greater emphasis on integration toarrive at congruent brand perceptions Organisations will need to considercarefully the appointment of new members to the brand team taking intoaccount the teamrsquos composition and whether new and existing members will beable to work together We have reviewed some of the mechanisms that may beused to assist the brand team in surfacing their perceptions and resolving anyinconsistencies Such mechanisms can help in the creation of a coherent brandidentity Organisations should then consider initiating internal programmes tocommunicate the brandrsquos identity to employees

We have recently embarked on empirical research to test our model of brandidentity and the internal factors we believe influence brand perceptions andperformance Our findings will be reported in future publications

References

Aaker JL (1997) ` Dimensions of brand personalityrsquorsquo Journal of Marketing Research Vol 34August pp 347-56

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

452

interpretation is likely to increase incongruous brand perceptions amongemployees Hence we propose

P17 Explaining to employees how consumer advertisements are designedto communicate the corporate brand identity will increase thecongruence between the brand teamrsquos and employeesrsquo perceptionsabout the nature of the brand

Mechanisms for surfacing and harmonising perceptionsWe now discuss mechanisms that can be used to help brand teams andemployees surface and harmonise their perceptions and develop congruentbrand perceptions

One approach is to use an independent facilitator (de Chernatony andDaniels 1994) The facilitator collates team membersrsquo anonymous individualbrand perceptions and then leads a workshop in which the range of perceptionsare discussed and a consensus reached regarding each of the brand identitycomponents This approach allows diverse views to be debated openly withthe facilitator ensuring they are each given due consideration The facilitatoras an impartial co-ordinator reduces the potential for conflict and preventsdomination of any team members Heterogeneous teams should find thisapproach particularly beneficial

Two techniques used in strategic decision making to assist the expressionand resolution of perceptions are dialectical inquiry (DI) and devilrsquos advocacy(DA) (Schweiger et al 1986) DI involves inducing maximal conflict byrequiring a team to debate two opposing views DA induces conflict throughthe consideration and critique of one view These techniques may be used byheterogeneous brand teams to legitimise and manage conflicting views aboutthe nature of the brand They should thus maximise the benefits of teamdiversity and result in greater consensus by allowing conflicting perceptions tobe expressed and resolved (cf Priem et al 1995) By forcing wider debate thesetechniques may also be used by homogeneous brand teams to counteract thepossibility of groupthink (Janis 1972)

A powerful device for creating a coherent focus among large numbers ofindividuals engaged in the development of a common concept was described byDumas (1994) in relation to design Dumas (1994) advocated the use of object-based metaphors called ` totemsrsquorsquo to build shared mental models Totems mayconsist of visual photographs or images and a set of words and provide agestalt that makes explicit the collective tacit knowledge of a team ofindividuals from a range of functional backgrounds Examples include ` tallboyrsquorsquo as a metaphor for the Honda ` Cityrsquorsquo (Clark and Fujimoto 1990) and ` rugbyplayer in a business suitrsquorsquo for the Honda ` Accordrsquorsquo (Nonaka 1991) AlthoughDumas (1994) described the use of totems by design teams developing newproducts the process may be used by brand teams as a simplifying andunifying device to reflect de Chernatonyrsquos (1999) six brand identitycomponents The brand team could then use a totem to help communicate abrandrsquos identity to employees and guide their behaviour accordingly

Corporatebranding

453

To gain employeesrsquo commitment to a brandrsquos identity it is important toestablish staff communication programmes Internal organisationalcommunication is crucial for providing and obtaining information achievingunderstanding and gaining employeesrsquo commitment (Gilly and Woolfinbarger1998) Employees need to know what is expected of them and how they cancontribute to the brandrsquos identity through their behaviour For example BUPARailtrack and Great North Eastern Railway have all introduced internalprogrammes to inform employees about their brand values and involve them inacting as ` ambassadorsrsquorsquo for their brands (Mistry 1998 Hemsley 1998 Wilson1998) Involvement facilitates understanding and consensus (Maier 1967Wooldridge and Floyd 1990) It is therefore important that employees areactively involved in the process of building a brandrsquos identity

Concluding remarksCorporate branding requires increased emphasis on internal brand resources topresent a coherent brand identity to stakeholders de Chernatonyrsquos (1999)identity-reputation gap model of brand management conceptualises brandbuilding as the process of narrowing the gap between brand identity and brandreputation Building on this we have identified key internal factors that wepropose affect the leverage of brand resources to enhance brand performanceEmployees play a crucial role in the brand building process and managers canfurther lever their brand potential by striving to achieve greater congruenceamong members of the brand team and between the team and other employeesIt is therefore crucial that corporate marketers adopt a planning perspectivewhich incorporates both internal pan-company marketing as well as thetraditional external perspective to ensure that there is synergy betweenemployeesrsquo actions resulting in optimising consumersrsquo satisfaction

Organisations also need to pay attention to the composition of their brandteams and be aware of their strengths and weaknesses The increasingheterogeneity of brand teams under corporate branding should enhance theresources of the brand team but will require greater emphasis on integration toarrive at congruent brand perceptions Organisations will need to considercarefully the appointment of new members to the brand team taking intoaccount the teamrsquos composition and whether new and existing members will beable to work together We have reviewed some of the mechanisms that may beused to assist the brand team in surfacing their perceptions and resolving anyinconsistencies Such mechanisms can help in the creation of a coherent brandidentity Organisations should then consider initiating internal programmes tocommunicate the brandrsquos identity to employees

We have recently embarked on empirical research to test our model of brandidentity and the internal factors we believe influence brand perceptions andperformance Our findings will be reported in future publications

References

Aaker JL (1997) ` Dimensions of brand personalityrsquorsquo Journal of Marketing Research Vol 34August pp 347-56

Corporatebranding

453

To gain employeesrsquo commitment to a brandrsquos identity it is important toestablish staff communication programmes Internal organisationalcommunication is crucial for providing and obtaining information achievingunderstanding and gaining employeesrsquo commitment (Gilly and Woolfinbarger1998) Employees need to know what is expected of them and how they cancontribute to the brandrsquos identity through their behaviour For example BUPARailtrack and Great North Eastern Railway have all introduced internalprogrammes to inform employees about their brand values and involve them inacting as ` ambassadorsrsquorsquo for their brands (Mistry 1998 Hemsley 1998 Wilson1998) Involvement facilitates understanding and consensus (Maier 1967Wooldridge and Floyd 1990) It is therefore important that employees areactively involved in the process of building a brandrsquos identity

Concluding remarksCorporate branding requires increased emphasis on internal brand resources topresent a coherent brand identity to stakeholders de Chernatonyrsquos (1999)identity-reputation gap model of brand management conceptualises brandbuilding as the process of narrowing the gap between brand identity and brandreputation Building on this we have identified key internal factors that wepropose affect the leverage of brand resources to enhance brand performanceEmployees play a crucial role in the brand building process and managers canfurther lever their brand potential by striving to achieve greater congruenceamong members of the brand team and between the team and other employeesIt is therefore crucial that corporate marketers adopt a planning perspectivewhich incorporates both internal pan-company marketing as well as thetraditional external perspective to ensure that there is synergy betweenemployeesrsquo actions resulting in optimising consumersrsquo satisfaction

Organisations also need to pay attention to the composition of their brandteams and be aware of their strengths and weaknesses The increasingheterogeneity of brand teams under corporate branding should enhance theresources of the brand team but will require greater emphasis on integration toarrive at congruent brand perceptions Organisations will need to considercarefully the appointment of new members to the brand team taking intoaccount the teamrsquos composition and whether new and existing members will beable to work together We have reviewed some of the mechanisms that may beused to assist the brand team in surfacing their perceptions and resolving anyinconsistencies Such mechanisms can help in the creation of a coherent brandidentity Organisations should then consider initiating internal programmes tocommunicate the brandrsquos identity to employees

We have recently embarked on empirical research to test our model of brandidentity and the internal factors we believe influence brand perceptions andperformance Our findings will be reported in future publications

References

Aaker JL (1997) ` Dimensions of brand personalityrsquorsquo Journal of Marketing Research Vol 34August pp 347-56

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

454

Abratt R (1989) `A new approach to the corporate image management processrsquorsquo Journal ofMarketing Management Vol 5 No 1 pp 63-76

Balmer JMT (1995) ` Corporate branding and connoisseurshiprsquorsquo Journal of GeneralManagement Vol 21 No 1 pp 24-46

Balmer JMT and Wilkinson A (1991) `Building societies change strategy and corporateidentityrsquorsquo Journal of General Management Vol 17 No 2 pp 20-33

Bantel KA and Jackson SE (1989) ` Top management and innovations in banking does thecomposition of the top team make a differencersquorsquo Strategic Management Journal Vol 10pp 107-24

Belk RW (1988) `Possessions and the extended selfrsquorsquo Journal of Consumer Research Vol 15September pp 139-68

Bettencourt LA and Brown SW (1997) ` Contact employees relationships among workplacefairness job satisfaction and prosocial behavioursrsquorsquo Journal of Retailing Vol 73 No 1 pp 39-61

Beyaztas B (1998) `Why marketers keep on movingrsquorsquo Marketing 24 September p 95

Beyer JM Chadttopadhyay P George E Glick WH and Pugliese D (1997) ` The selectiveperception of managers revisitedrsquorsquo Academy of Management Journal Vol 40 No 3 pp 716-37

Boulding KE (1956) The Image University of Michigan Press Ann Arbor MI

Bowman C and Ambrosini V (1996) ` Tracking patterns of realised strategyrsquorsquo Journal ofGeneral Management Vol 21 No 3 pp 59-73

Brown A (1995) Organisational Culture Pitman Publishing London

Carroll GR and Harrison JR (1998) `Organizational demography and culture insights from aformal model and simulationrsquorsquo Administrative Science Quarterly Vol 43 pp 637-67

Clark KB and Fujimoto T (1990) ` The power of product integrityrsquorsquo Harvard Business ReviewNovember-Decemberpp 107-18

Collins JC and Porras JI (1996) Built to Last Successful Habits of Visionary CompaniesHarperCollins London

Deal TE and Kennedy AA (1982) Corporate Cultures The Rites and Rituals of Corporate LifeAddison-Wesley Reading MA

de Chernatony L (1999) ` Brand management through narrowing the gap between brandidentity and brand reputationrsquorsquo Journal of Marketing Management Vol 15 pp 157-79

de Chernatony L and DallrsquoOlmo Riley F (1998) `Defining a `brandrsquo beyond the literature withexpertsrsquo interpretationsrsquorsquo Journal of Marketing Management Vol 14 pp 417-43

de Chernatony L and Daniels K (1994) ` Developing a more effective brand positioningrsquorsquo TheJournal of Brand Management Vol 1 No 6 pp 373-9

de Chernatony L Daniels K and Johnson G (1993) ` Competitive positioning strategiesmirroring sellersrsquo and buyersrsquo perceptionsrsquorsquo Journal of Strategic Marketing Vol 1 pp 229-48

de Chernatony L Harris F and DallrsquoOlmo Riley F (2001) `Added value its nature roles andsustainabilityrsquorsquo European Journal of Marketing (in press)

DelVecchio SK (1998) ` The salespersonrsquos operating freedom A matter of perceptionrsquorsquoIndustrial Marketing Management Vol 27 pp 31-40

Dowling GR (1994) Corporate Reputations Kogan Page London

Dubrin AJ (1994) Applying Psychology Individual and Organizational Effectiveness 4th edPrentice-Hall Englewood Cliffs NJ

Dumas A (1994) ` Building totems metaphor-making in product developmentrsquorsquo DesignManagement Journal Vol 5 No 1 pp 71-82

Erez M (1992) ` Interpersonal communication systems in organisations and their relationshipsto cultural values productivity and innovation the case of Japanese corporationsrsquorsquo AppliedPsychology An International Review Vol 41 No 1 pp 43-64

Corporatebranding

455

Eysenck MW and Keane MT (1990) Cognitive Psychology Lawrence Erlbaum AssociatesHove East Sussex

Fisher RJ Maltz E and Jaworski BJ (1997) `Enhancing communication between marketingand engineering the moderating role of relative functional identificationrsquorsquo Journal ofMarketing Vol 61 July pp 54-70

Fombrun C and Rindova V (1996) `Whorsquos tops and who decides The social construction ofcorporate reputationsrsquorsquo working paper Stern Business School New York University NY

Fombrun C and van Riel C (1997) ` The reputational landscapersquorsquo Corporate Reputation ReviewVol 1 No 12 pp 5-13

Fournier S (1998) ` Consumers and their brands developing relationship theory in consumerresearchrsquorsquo Journal of Consumer Research Vol 24 March pp 343-73

Fournier S and Yao JL (1997) ` Reviving brand loyalty a reconceptualization within theframework of consumer-brand relationshipsrsquorsquo International Journal of Research inMarketing Vol 14 pp 451-72

Freeman E and Liedtka J (1997) ` Stakeholder capitalism and the value chainrsquorsquo EuropeanManagement Journal Vol 15 No 3 pp 286-96

Gilly MC and Wolfinbarger M (1998) `Advertisingrsquos internal audiencersquorsquo Journal of MarketingVol 62 January pp 69-88

GuilleAcircn MF (1994) `The age of eclecticism current organizational trends and the evolution ofmanagerial modelsrsquorsquo Sloan Management Review Fall pp 75-86

Gutman J (1982) `A means-end chain model based on consumer categorization processesrsquorsquoJournal of Marketing Vol 46 Spring pp 60-72

Hambrick DC and Mason PA (1984) ` Upper echelons the organization as a reflection of itstop managersrsquorsquo Academy of Management Review Vol 9 pp 193-206

Harrison DA Price KH and Bell MP (1998) ` Beyond relational demography time and theeffects of surface- and deep-level diversity on work group cohesionrsquorsquo Academy ofManagement Journal Vol 41 No 1 pp 96-107

Hemsley S (1998) ` Internal affairsrsquorsquo Marketing Week April 2 pp 49-50 53

Hogg MK and Mitchell PCN (1996) ` Identity self and consumption a conceptualframeworkrsquorsquo Journal of Marketing Management Vol 12 No 7 pp 629-44

Janis I (1972) Victims of Groupthink A Psychological Study of Foreign-Policy Decisions andFiascos Houghton-Mifflin Boston MA

Kapferer J-N (1997) Strategic Brand Management Creating and Sustaining Brand Equity LongTerm 2nd ed Kogan Page London

Kennedy SH (1977) ` Nurturing corporate images total communication or ego triprsquorsquo EuropeanJournal of Marketing Vol 11 No 1 pp 120-64

Kotter JP and Heskett JL (1992) Corporate Culture and Performance The Free Press NewYork NY

Lichtenstein R Alexander JA Jinnet K and Ullman E (1997) `Embedded intergrouprelations in interdisciplinary teams Effects on perceptions of team integrationrsquorsquo TheJournal of Applied Behavioural Science Vol 3 No 4 pp 413-34

McCracken G (1993) ` The value of the brand an anthropological perspectiversquorsquo in Aaker DAand Biel AL (Eds) Brand Equity and Advertising Lawrence Erlbaum AssociatesHillsdale NJ

McDonald P and Gandz J (1991) ` Identification of values relevant to business researchrsquorsquoHuman Resource Management Summer Vol 30 No 2 pp 217-36

Maier NRF (1967) `Assets and liabilities in group problem solvingrsquorsquo Psychological ReviewVol 74 No 4 pp 239-49

EuropeanJournal ofMarketing3534

456

Meglino BM and Ravlin EC (1998) ` Individual values in organizations conceptscontroversiesand researchrsquorsquo Journal of Management Vol 24 No 3 pp 351-89

Mistry B (1998) ` Life and soul of the brandrsquorsquo Marketing March 26 pp 47-9

Mitchell A (1997) Brand Strategies in the Information Age Financial Times Report London

Murray AI (1989) `Top management group heterogeneity and firm performancersquorsquo StrategicManagement Journal Vol 10 pp 125-41

Nonaka I (1991) ` The knowledge-creating companyrsquorsquo Harvard Business Review November-December pp 96-104

Priem RL Harrison DA and Muir NK (1995) ` Structured conflict and consensusoutcomes ingroup decision makingrsquorsquo Journal of Management Vol 21 No 4 pp 691-710

Reger RK (1990) `Managerial through structures and competitive positioningrsquorsquo in Huff AS(Ed) Mapping Strategic Thought John Wiley amp Sons Chichester

Robbins SP (1991) Organizational Behaviour Concepts Controversies and Applications5th ed Prentice-Hall International Englewood Cliffs NJ

Rokeach M (1973) The Nature of Human Values The Free Press New York NY

Rositer J and Percy L (1996) Advertising Communications and Promotion ManagementMcGraw-Hill New York NY

Ruekert RW and Walker OC Jr (1987) `Marketingrsquos interaction with other functional units aconceptual framework and empirical evidencersquorsquo Journal of Marketing Vol 51 January pp 1-19

Schneider B and Bowen D (1985) ` Employee and customer perceptions of service in banksreplication and extensionrsquorsquo Journal of Applied Psychology Vol 70 pp 423-33

Schweiger DM Sandberg WR and Ragan JW (1986) ` Group approaches for improvingstrategic decision making a comparative analysis of dialectical inquiry devilrsquos advocacyand consensusrsquorsquo Academy of Management Journal Vol 29 No 1 pp 51-71

Smith KG Smith KA Olian JD Sims HP Jr OrsquoBannon DP and Scully JA (1994) ` Topmanagement team demography the role of social integration and communicationrsquorsquoAdministrative Science Quarterly Vol 39 No 3 pp 412-38

Tajfel H and Fraser C (1978) Introducing Social Psychology An Analysis of Individual Reactionand Response Penguin Books Harmondsworth

Tjosvold D (1987) `Participation a close look at its dynamicsrsquorsquo Journal of Management Vol 13No 4 pp 739-50

van Riel CBM and Balmer JMT (1997) ` Corporate identity the concept its measurement andmanagementrsquorsquo European Journal of Marketing Vol 31 No 56 pp 340-55

Wagner WG Pfeffer J and OrsquoReilly CA (1984) ` Organisational demography and turnover intop-management groupsrsquorsquo Administrative Science Quarterly Vol 29 pp 74-92

Wilkins AL and Ouchi WG (1983) ` Efficient cultures exploring the relationship betweenculture and organizational performancersquorsquo Administrative Science Quarterly Vol 28pp 468-81

Wilson R (1998) `Action stationsrsquorsquo Marketing Week February 16 pp 78-9

Wooldridge B and Floyd SW (1990) ` The strategy process middle management involvementand organizational performancersquorsquo Strategic Management Journal Vol 11 pp 231-41

Zenger TR and Lawrence BS (1989) `Organizational demography the differential effects ofage and tenure distributions on technical communicationrsquorsquo Academy of ManagementJournal Vol 32 pp 353-76