Communicating Internally About Corporate Reputation

Ericka WebbCommunications ManagerBest Buy, Inc.

What Is Corporate Reputation?

Best Buy defines it as a measure of trust in a company’s actions and words

Noticing A Gap

• Incorporate reputation data into – Business decisions– Communication plans

My Research Question

• Do Corporate Employees Have The Same Opinion of Best Buy’s Reputation as Non-Employees?

How Do We Do Find Out?

• Administer the Reputation Tracker survey to corporate employees

• Electronic, self-selecting survey

• Phased communications raised awareness and encouraged participation

What We Asked

• Survey consisted of 20 questions

• Sample questions– How important would a given attribute be to

you if you were evaluating a company– Rate your overall perception of the company– How likely would you be to recommend this

company to a friend for employment, shopping or investing

How Do We Measure?

• Two metrics used for comparison – Overall Score– Individual attributes

What Non-Employees Say

Non-employee Reputation Scores

Social responsibility

A good place to work

Diversity

Trustworthy

Quality Products/Services

Customer service

What Employees Say

Comparative Reputation Scores

Social responsibility

A good place to work

Diversity

Trustworthy

Quality Products/Services

Customer service

Very Different Opinions

Non-employee Employee

Overall Reputation Scores

What We Wanted To Know

• Do employees have the same opinion of Best Buy’s reputation as non-employees?

• No, there are significant differences in opinions.

What Do The Scores Mean?

Possible explanations– Employees are advocates and critics – Self-selecting respondents– Demographic information missing– Poor timing– Technical constraints– Accurate portrayal

What I Would Do Next

• Create internal communication plan for top six attributes

• Begin PR and internal communications meetings

• Survey again in one year to gauge efforts

What Best Buy Is Doing

• Employee survey will be administered again– Include retail employees in sample– Not self-selecting sample– Analyzed in Perseus, Best Buy’s survey tool

• Follow up focus groups

Data Isn’t Good Or Bad, Just Actionable