10 Ways to Damage Your Organization’s Reputation (2025 Edition)

1. Manage reputation reactively. Wait until a crisis trends on X (Twitter) or goes viral on TikTok before responding. Never monitor social listening tools or online sentiment.
2. Treat reputation as a communications problem. Delegate your organization’s credibility—which drives up to 80% of market value—to a small PR team. Expect them to spin away systemic issues with press releases and influencer partnerships.
3. Never prepare for inevitable crises. Assume leaders will make perfect decisions under pressure, even without scenario planning, crisis simulations, or clear protocols. Wing it when deepfakes, data breaches, or employee whistleblowers emerge.
4. Ignore early warning signals. Don’t scan social media, employee review sites (Glassdoor), or stakeholder forums for brewing issues. Treat rapid change as unpredictable chaos rather than something you can actively monitor and prepare for.
5. Build reputation through advertising alone. Invest millions in brand campaigns while ignoring employee experience, product quality, and customer service. Assume external messaging matters more than internal reality.
6. Treat employees as expendable resources. View your workforce as a cost center, not as brand ambassadors whose Glassdoor reviews, LinkedIn posts, and dinner-table conversations shape your reputation daily.
7. Never consider stakeholder perspectives. Operate with shareholder primacy as your only lens. Ignore customers, communities, suppliers, and activists who can destroy your reputation overnight with a viral post or coordinated boycott.
8. Dismiss what you can’t easily measure. Ignore trust, culture, and brand equity because they’re “intangible.” Never invest in reputation measurement tools or track Net Promoter Score, employee engagement, or ESG ratings.
9. Treat ethics and sustainability as PR checkboxes. Issue glossy ESG reports while practicing greenwashing, paying lip service to diversity, or hiding supply chain abuses. Assume Gen Z employees and consumers won’t call you out.
10. Believe reputation doesn’t matter—until it’s gone. Dismiss Warren Buffett’s warning: “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it.” Learn this lesson the hard way when a single scandal tanks your stock, talent pipeline, and customer loyalty.

I would appreciate comment about this list.

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Reputation Masterclasses: Building and Protecting Your Brand – Essential Workshops for February and March 2025 I have scheduled the following event training dates that are ideal for developing your own and your team’s reputation management competency levels, as follows: Real-Time Crisis Communication Management Masterclass 26 – 27 February Product Recall Crisis Management Masterclass 20 March Stakeholder Reputation Management Masterclass 24 – 25 March The training will take place at the Apollo Hotel in Randburg, Johannesburg (close to Multichoice HO). REGISTER NOW!   Early Bird Special Pricing is available until 7 February 2025.

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Online Training: Learn How To Mitigate Stakeholder Reputation Risk (Online) Stakeholder Reputation Risk is regarded worldwide as one of the most difficult risks to manage. Stakeholder Reputation Risk emerges when the reasonable expectations of stakeholders are not met. To adequately understand this dynamic, delegates need a thorough grounding in understanding both Stakeholder Management and Reputation Risk Mitigation processes. To create this training, I have combined key takeaways from my Stakeholder Reputation, Reputation Risk Management, and Crisis Management training masterclasses with the latest thinking from reputation risk management practices, strategic communication, risk management, ethics, community relations, marketing, stakeholder management, organizational behavior, sustainability, and corporate governance literature. The online program is designed to show business leaders and managers how to establish an excellent reputation with; and maintain positive, mutually beneficial relationships with stakeholders and minimize potential risk. An Organisation’s reputation is derived from how stakeholders perceive the organization, its communication, and behavior in the markets in which it operates. Risk emerges when these perceptions and tools do not fulfill their reasonable expectations. In order to effectively manage the interface between an organization and its stakeholders a number of issues and topics have to be taken care of, including: – Understanding How and Why Reputation Risk emerge; – Understanding how to profile stakeholders i.e. Who are our stakeholders and what do they want and need? – Being clear on what we want from and need from our stakeholders; – Understanding the strategies that need to be in place to mitigate risk and satisfy stakeholder needs and wants and create long-term collaborative relationships; – Understanding the processes that need to be put in place to enable the execution of strategies and minimize risk; – An understanding of the capabilities that need to be put in place to make these processes work; – Understanding how to mitigate both reputation erosion and reputation risk events if and when they occur. The workshop offers an integrated framework for managing stakeholder management relationships, as well as practical tools that can be used for developing and improving existing relationships, and mitigate potential reputation risks. It is also important to take a look at my standard Stakeholder Reputation Management Training Course‘s outline and learning agenda as I incorporate and weave most of that information into this training. Email me for more information and a registration form.

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I am proud to announce that I will be facilitating an “Unlocking the Power of Reputation Management” 4-hour session on the UCT GSB Alexander Forbes Executive Development Programme on Monday 19 April. Alexander Forbes is a market-leading, advice-led provider of integrated retirement and investment solutions as well as holistic wealth management.   For 85 years the Alexander Forbes brand has been synonymous with financial expertise and innovative, yet reliable, solutions. The University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business is one of just three triple-crowned business schools in Africa with endorsements from the European Foundation for Management Development (EQUIS), the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) and the Association of MBAs (AMBA).

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Chances are incredibly high that your company is going to experience a crisis of some kind in the next year.

It’s how you handle that crisis that will likely determine whether that crisis builds or seriously damages your company.

As 90 percent of crisis response is communication-related, I would suggest that you think about the need to respond in real-time, as Robert Scoble suggested when he was quoted in Fast Company when he said: “Reputations are created and destroyed online in the speed of 140 characters.”

He obviously referred to Twitter at that time (now 280 characters) and the common phrase today that reputation can be created (Susan Boyle) and destroyed overnight (Bernie Madoff). (Remember the plane landing in the Hudson River. Ordinary people were tweeting pictures and video footage to the networks before the Media actually got there).

A crisis can strike a Business at any time, and during this crisis, a Company’s image and reputation can be damaged significantly. Often, this can be a result of not responding adequately to media and other stakeholder inquiries.

Understanding what Communication challenges may arise during a crisis or before one occurs is therefore critical.

In the book Real-Time Marketing & PR, David Meerman Scott teaches how to use time and urgency to gain a huge competitive advantage, and I quote:

‘In a world where speed and agility are now essential to success, most organizations still operate slowly and deliberately, cementing each step months in advance, responding to new developments with careful but time-consuming processes. The Internet has fundamentally changed the pace of business, compressing time and rewarding speed. Your accustomed methods and processes may be already fatally out of sync with the world around you. The narrative of your business now unfolds, minute-by-minute, in real-time. And it’s no longer guided by the mass media your ad budget can buy.’

Speed is thus of the essence. That’s why it is vital that you develop a crisis communications and management plan or kit that prepares you in advance for this eventuality. This communication kit should assist your organization to respond timeously and promptly to crisis situations.

Here’s a starter list of eight items that should be included in any crisis communications kit:

1. A list of the members of the crisis management team, which should include, at minimum, the CEO, a trusted assistant/top manager from the CEO’s office, heads of each department, Investor Relations Officer details, public relations, and marketing team members, legal and security. In case of an actual crisis, this team will be focused down to the group applicable to that specific crisis.

2. Contact information for key officers, spokespeople, and crisis management team members including company and personal phone numbers, email addresses, cell numbers, instant message handles, Twitter addresses, even spouse’s cell numbers, should the person be inaccessible by other means.

With the astute use of technology today, the above contact details could be kept in online contact databases in Google Contacts or in the cloud in services like Dropbox.  You should have the Crisis team’s details on fast dial on your smartphone.

3. Fact sheets on the company, each division, each physical location, and each product offered.
These should be in camera-ready condition, plus available on a USB stick in a generally-accepted word processor format (Microsoft Word) so they can be revised and printed out if necessary on a computer external to your facilities. Photos should also be included.

4. Profiles and biographies for each key manager in your company, again in camera-ready condition, in the cloud, and on USB.

5. Copies of your company, division and product logos, your press release format, and the scanned-in signature of your CEO on USB or in a format that works on your internal word processing program (plus one in Microsoft Word in case you have to work on a computer that isn’t tied to your network.)

6. Holding statements or Pre-written scripts answering key questions that you have generated through your crisis scenario analysis. Included in these scripts should be the words you use to say “we don’t have that information yet, but will let you know as soon as it becomes available.”

7. Contact information for each of your key media contacts both locally, nationally, and if appropriate, key financial press and analysts. Contact information for your appropriate stakeholders like suppliers, political, regulatory, and union leaders should also be included. Don’t be afraid to go overboard here – if you have an oil spill, your CEO will probably want to call not only the Media but also selected Government representatives.

8. Flowcharts of the Protocols & Procedures to be followed. These will differ depending on the type of crisis. For instance, in the event of death, it is vital that the Department of Labour be informed, forthwith according to the Occupational Health & Safety Act. Obviously, you first want to inform management. Then,  the authorities. In the case of a fire, there may be other communication protocols to be followed.

Flowcharts can help to speed up decision-making.

Where & Who should keep the Toolkit

It’s important for your crisis communications kit to not only be duplicated in some offsite location and in the cloud but to also include information, disks, graphics, computer files, photos, etc. that are normally readily at your fingertips in your office. Alternatively, this information should be in a password-controlled format on your website/intranet.

I once knew the Crisis Manager of a Rail organization. She kept the copy of her plan at home, at the office, and in her car. Just in case.

I strongly recommend that you assemble this kit shortly. It will be one of the best insurance policies that you can have on hand once a crisis begins.

Remember time is of the essence in a crisis and the key is to prepare for real-time communication. This toolkit (currently available as a time-limited discounted special) can help to shorten your learning curve in creating your own plan.

For more information on crisis management and communications, I recommend that you check out my various blog posts.

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Imagine when faced with a crisis, your team has to start from a zero-based approach. Is it not better to have a blueprint designed to guide you before, during, and after a crisis?

A Written Crisis Management and Communication Response plan is essential in today’s always-on, 24/7 world. News and information flow in “real-time” and Stakeholders expect you to respond effectively to crisis reality and communication challenges.

When a crisis hits an organization, it is time for Crisis Managers to take the lead and a plan guides the way.

Crises offer organizations both immense opportunities and threats. A Crisis has the potential to destroy people, fine reputations, disrupt operations and destroy share prices and the integrity of an organization.

The challenge lies in how to respond to and in such an event.

Appropriate Crisis Response includes preparation, response, and recovery components, but more than that it is led and managed by well-trained, competent leaders that understand the how, why and what of a crisis and can lead through the proverbial stormy seas.

The Importance of the First Responder

There are first responders in any incident. Sometimes it is the trained first aider that rushes to deal with an injury, sometimes it is the PR department fielding a call from the media alleging environmental pollution, other times it may be the HR and Security managers that have to attend to an incident of workplace violence.

First Responders may be in your legal department fielding product recall liabilities, but regardless of their specific job titles, they must be capable of grasping the enormity of a critical event as it unfolds. “Before first responders arrive to assess a crisis, your internal leaders need to be prepared for – and trained in – the science of crisis response”, to quote Laurence Barton in the excellent book Crisis Leadership Now – A Real-world Guide to Preparing for Threats, Disaster, Sabotage, and Scandal.

Crisis Managers understand that what at first seems like a non-specific event or problem could rapidly escalate into being a genuine crisis. I like to call these smoldering crises, small, insignificant events that can result in unplanned visibility should it go public.

A smouldering crisis is any serious business problem which is not generally known within or without the organisation, which may generate negative news coverage if or when it goes “public” and could result in fines, penalties, or unbudgeted expenses or breakdown of relationships.

Crisis Managers understand their industry and worry about potential incidents that can harm them. Oil companies like Engen, BP, and PETROSA worry about potential refinery fires, explosions, spills, and other disruptions – and there are specific grounds for that. A Few years ago the Engen refinery in Durban was hit by lightning resulting in a major fire and millions of rands of damage.

Organizations like Sasol worry about a recurrence of the explosion that claimed a number of lives.

Organizations worry because even though they have excellent health & safety records, not even the best crisis prevention plans cannot always a momentary lapse of reason, an oversight, or just plain human error.

Others worry about potential product recalls – and you should if you are selling, manufacturing, or distributing – as we have had a number of high profiled withdrawals.

Other organizations worry about workplace stoppages’, outages, and potential mistrust being created through wrongful actions by employees.

Research shows that no organization is immune. And that should make you worry whether you are a director, shareholder, or employee.

But worry is like a rocking chair. You move back and forward but go nowhere. Should you not train your leaders in the science of crisis response?

Should you not be preparing for a crisis by creating a cadre of competent potential crisis leaders? That decision is yours.

Just remember that Noah built the Ark before it rained. This training and/or toolkit will help you to be prepared and to be a Crisis Leader like Noah.

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68% of clients surveyed have no framework in place for reputational risk

A New survey on Reputation risk by Willis Towers Watson (NASDAQ: WLTW), a leading global advisory, broking and solutions company, has revealed that 86 percent of clients are concerned about loss of income and a reduced customer base due to reputational risk.

The velocity of message flow in an interconnected 24/7 world has also made organizations concerned about protecting their hard-won reputations.

Key findings from the survey of 200 global organisations include:

• Seven in ten (72%) report that risk management teams have at least some responsibility for the monitoring, measuring or management of reputational risk.
• Nearly the same proportion said that reputational risk is reported at the C-Suite (61%) or Board level (66%) within their organisation. Almost eight in ten (80%)believe that the focus on reputational risk in their business will only increase in the coming five years.The majority of respondents highlighted that reputational risks could result in potentially crippling business outcomes for their organisation such as loss of income (86%) and weakened human capital, because of their reduced ability to retain (62%) or attract (57%) talented employees.
• Framed against this increasing focus, most respondents pointed out that when it comes to measuring and monitoring reputational risk, they face real challenges in accessing reliable data (51%), with a large proportion (42%) indicating they have inadequate tools to do so*

Garret Gaughan, Head of Global Markets P&C Hub, Willis Towers Watson, said “Reputational risk is increasingly of concern to our clients with most Risk Mangers now having some responsibility for risk mitigation in this area.

As a previously difficult to insure risk it is unsurprising that all of the survey participants agreed it would be helpful to them to have access to a reputation platform. WTW in partnership with Polecat, a leader in technology and reputation intelligence, has designed a platform that will allow organizations to monitor reputational threats in real-time and provide them with reputational impact scores against their peers for issues and risks. To complement this platform, Willis Towers Watson will soon be launching a risk transfer solution for this previously uninsurable risk. We believe that this combined approach will deliver reputational risk solutions to address our clients’ needs.”Download a full copy of the report here – www.willistowerswatson.com/en-GB/Insights/2021/01/global-reputational-risk-management-survey

Footnote – I addressed aspects of managing the velocity flow in my blog post An External Communication Policy – A Tool for Reducing Reputation Risk

• Also, where reputation cannot be easily measured I recommend a stakeholder-focused and “issue-based‘‘ approach to issues and incidents will aid in protecting the reputation.
• By examining and extrapolating and viewing issues and incidents through the lenses of a stakeholder, opportunities, shortcomings, and mitigation approaches will be revealed. Even though this is closely aligned to the ethical training provided by the Compliance department, this type of thinking and approach goes much further.
• There is thus a need to educate management to factor stakeholder management and reputation management thinking into decisionmaking
  processes. Read my posts on Reputation-based Decision-making.

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I am quoted in the book “Crisis Counsel-Navigating Legal and Communication Conflict” by Dr Tony Jacques I am honored to be one of the four leading global experts on crisis management; interviewed for this book.

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Santa Claus is definitely not dead to many.

His reputation remains intact, but to the contrary, there are many companies no longer around, and not all of the failures are due to Covid19.

In fact, if failed companies have obituaries many of them would read as follows:

‘Here lies the XYZ Company, born 1966, died 2020 after a reputation risk incident.

Mourned by directors, staff, shareholders, and other stakeholders. No flowers.

Rather send donations to the Society for the Preservation of Trust, Integrity and Reputation.

Afterthought: Most companies say that reputation is vital, yet if you check their annual learning & development agendas there is no provision made to train Directors, executives, management & staff about why reputation is an asset and a risk and should be managed and protected.

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Important Notice – Email Address Change Please note that my email address has changed. Please use deon (at) deonbinneman.com from the 1st December 2020.

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