Transferring Reputation to the Corporation in Different Cultures: Individuals, Collectives, Systems and the Strategic Management of Corporate Reputation

Abstract

In the resource-based view of the firm, corporate reputation can be considered an extremely important resource. The firm, besides having a corporate reputation, also participates at three other levels, from each of which reputational content can be transferred to the corporate level. These are: the individual level of the employee or agent, the collective level of the group or network to which the firm belongs and, finally, the level of the system in which the firm operates. Whether reputational content can in fact be easily transferred from one level to another, depends on a number of factors. Most significant amongst these are the structure of the firm's environment at the different levels and how this is perceived by the firm's audience. This paper sets out to describe the transferability of reputation taking into account the perception and underlying psychological processes which vary with cultural differences. The theoretical discussion leads to a number of research questions regarding the relationship between the likelihood of successful transference and the particular culture shared by the corporate audience.