Building Reputation and Regulation Equity

A good reputation is a hard-won asset, and always worth protecting. It offers assorted benefits ranging from a happy, productive workforce to competitive opportunities to regulatory advantage. Conversely, reputation damage can restrict business legitimacy and commercial freedom.

Reputational risk can arise from almost anywhere, anything from a cyber incident to a misjudged tweet. It should be treated as a business wide strategic issue, managed at executive level but overseen by the Board, which is ultimately responsible for identifying, reducing and mitigating risks.

One of the ways in which organisations can strengthen their reputations, and minimise risk, is by building reputation equity. This involves successfully engaging stakeholder groups and forming trusted and durable relationships with them.

Strategic stakeholder engagement and dialogue also builds mutual respect and co-operation, which can help identify trends and opportunities, as well as exposing risks and vulnerabilities. Marland Sykes helps clients to identify key stakeholders and manage these relationships in a way that can help generate shared value and contribute to long-term sustainability.

Successfully engaging stakeholders, building trusted relationships with them, ensuring that their perspectives are included in strategic decision-making, is a critical part of the ESG sustainability process. It will allow you to build reputation equity. This is the first stage of the Marland Sykes policy wheel.

Continuing this process will allow you to start building up regulation equity; in other words, having your voice heard by policy makers and their influencers (rather than being sidelined), demonstrating the societal and political legitimacy to justify being part of the debate, and being able to effect policy change. This will improve (or sustain) the commercial environment in which you operate and help deliver long term sustainability and shareholder value. 

Marland Sykes can support you at any point on the policy wheel. We can help you to start building your reputation, or support you in building up your regulation equity.

Equally, if your organisation enjoys reputation and/or regulation equity already, we can help you to protect and preserve that position in the years to come. Well defined and targeted stakeholder engagement will maintain and strengthen your position on the policy cycle, and each subsequent rotation of the cycle will serve to consolidate your equity and help safeguard you against future challenges to the long-term sustainability of your business.

 

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