where you make or sell itcommunications, i.e.

how you present what you do, and how you do it. (Olins 1988b:55) Corporate designers usually separate the discipline into three components: corporate image, corporate personality and visual identity. Corporate image refers to how the corporation is perceived both by internal and external audiences. Corporate personality is the essential or true nature of the corporation, which may be different from its corporate image. Visual identity is the component most familiar to the general public and consists of a myriad of items including, for example, the logo or symbol, sign systems and stationery. Corporate designers maintain that these three components are interdependent, and that a change in visual identity alone is purely cosmetic and useless in the long run. In order to achieve anything significant, a change in visual identity must be the expression of a change in corporate personality. For this reason some consultants include not only design services but also the related disciplines of management consultancy and marketing. Thus they would deny the accusation that their work is superficial or manipulativethe 2,000,000 just for a logo school of criticism. Visual identity may play only a small part. Corporate identity schemes have various objectives. They may be implemented in order to communicate that strategic changes have already taken place and in order to promote further changes, such as the British Telecom identity of 1991. This was intended first to proclaim that the company was no longer a bureaucratic public service which treated callers as nuisances, and second to further the transformation of BT into an efficient customerorientated business. Ian Vallance, chairman of British Telecom, said [the intention is] to get away totally from the public utility background from which BT springs (quoted in Hancock 1991:16). Other schemes have been introduced with the intention of initiating change, like that of Network South East of 1986 which was intended to shift the focus of the service from commuters to leisure travel during off-peak hours. Schemes also need to carry a variety of messages and one of the tasks for corporate designers is to identify audiences and the impressions to be conveyed to them; there are both internal and external groups to be considered. For a private sector business, the main external audiences are institutional consumersnational and local government, the City, the media, the unions and other companies. There are also audiences of individual consumerscustomers, potential employees and the wider public. Internal audiences are mainly the employees of the company but shareholders and pensioners may be included in this group. A company may want to present itself as dynamic and profitable to the City, dependable to an employee and helpful to a telephone inquirer. For internal audiences, identity programmes may be intended to promote loyalty, pride -241Questia, a part of Gale, Cengage Learning. www.questia.com Publication Information: Book Title: The Authority of the Consumer. Contributors: Russell

Keat - editor, Nigel Whiteley - editor, Nicholas Abercrombie - editor. Publisher: Routledge. Place of Publication: New York. Publication Year: 1994. Page Number: 241.

and self-confidence, as well as to promote standards of behaviour. This last aim was particularly important for the Metropolitan Police: [corporate identity] is to do with getting people inside the organisation to develop a clear instinct, intuition, or feel for what is and what is not appropriate for the organisation (Olins 1984:39). This instinctive sense of our way of doing things may start as a vision on the part of the senior management but will be transmitted to the rest of the organization by training programmes and by policies for promotions and sanctions. The organization will reward those who do things our way, and penalize those who do not. Corporate identity consists of a range of management disciplines and design services which enable companies to control how they are perceived and, therefore, how they perform in the market place. This may mean drastically changing a company, with staff training programmes, changes in working practices or extensive redundanciesin other words making strategic changes to the corporate personality. These changes may be directed towards empowering the individual consumer. Changes in visual identity might encourage consumers to perceive a corporation as approachable and responsive. However, visual identity must be underpinned by changes in working practices in order to ensure that the corporation really is approachable and responsive. This would be brought about by establishing mechanisms for consumer feedback via questionnaires and market research, and by ensuring that staff who have direct contact with consumers are trained to be courteous, attentive and unflappable. Companies such as British Gas which were previously bureaucratic, remote and more likely to treat the public as nuisances, now subject consumers to a charm offensive. It is on this level that consumers of a police force will be empowered. Before considering who these consumers are, it will be helpful to discuss some of the strategic problems faced by the Metropolitan Police. POLICING LONDON IN THE 1980s During the 1980s the British police were caught between conflicting demands from a variety of quarters. The government required public sector bodies to be more accountable and responsive to the needs of the public, while controlling public expenditure very tightly. Opinion polls and other publications revealed the publics anxiety about the ability of the police to contain the crime wave, while the media were quick to draw attention to any failings in the policeracism, corruption, fabricated evidence and false confessions, not to mention accidental shootings and brutality against striking workers. The 1980s provided a long catalogue of events in which the British police appeared to be oppressive, politically motivated and thuggish. Police officers began to feel besiegeddoing an -242Questia, a part of Gale, Cengage Learning. www.questia.com

Publication Information: Book Title: The Authority of the Consumer. Contributors: Russell Keat - editor, Nigel Whiteley - editor, Nicholas Abercrombie - editor. Publisher: Routledge. Place of Publication: New York. Publication Year: 1994. Page Number: 242.

Red flag or red rose? Rule Britannia or cool Britannia? Getting the identity right is seen to be strategically important. In a 1995 MORI poll, 166 senior people responsible for corporate identity in leading European companies rated the benefits of a strong corporate identity. Some of the results are shown in Table 7.1. Other benefits include helping companies recover from crises and recruitment of top employees. Corporate identity vs corporate image The terms 'corporate identity' and 'corporate image' are sometimes confused with each other. 1 Corporate identity is what the organisation communicates (either intentionally or unintentionally) via various cues, whereas its image is how its publics actually view it. An image is a perception and exists only in the mind of the receiver. To formulate an image, publics interpret an identity in a wider context with broader frames of reference. For example, Nike's corporate identity is a carefully managed amalgam of associations (with fashionable sports personalities, major sporting events such as the Olympics as well as local and charitable events), clear design and mission. Many people exposed to these aspects of its identity may well formulate an image of Nike as a high-quality and fashionable arbiter of good design. Others, aware of some negative media coverage of Nike's manufacturing policy in third world countries (interpreting the identity in a broader context), may form an image of Nike as exploitative and thus boycott its products. 2 Clearly, then, organisations cannot construct a corporate image because they cannot control the context in which their communication is received, interpreted or understood. Nevertheless, a clear, well-managed corporate identity can go some way to effecting a strategically important image, and a neglected corporate identity may send out all the wrong messages: 'An organisation may commonly assume that it only communicates when it wants to, but unfortunately for many companies, a failure to control communications results in a confused image' (Ind 1990:21). Table 7.1 Benefits of a strong corporate identity Percentage votes for each category by country Great Britain Public profile/recognition 53 Attracts customers/helps customer relations 30 Product/brand support 30 Visual presentation/unity 10 Financial advantages/confidence among the 20 financial community

France Germany 23 68 10 3 17 0 7 10 23 6

Express culture/values Staff motivation Support for advertising/communications Source: adapted from Schmidt 1997:42

30 10 13

3 3 3

3 23 0

-96Questia, a part of Gale, Cengage Learning. www.questia.com Publication Information: Book Title: The Public Relations Handbook. Contributors: Alison Theaker - author. Publisher: Routledge. Place of Publication: New York. Publication Year: 2004. Page Number: 96.

But managing an identity well means embracing all aspects of what van Riel (1995) calls the corporate identity (CI) mix - symbolism, communication and behaviour. The Nike case illustrates this well. Despite well-managed symbolism and communication, perceptions of aspects of its behaviour (reported treatment of third world workers) has affected some publics' image of the company.So, can corporate identity be effectively managed? And, if so, how? Key concepts of corporate identity Corporate identity management commonly involves: conducting research to determine senior management and a range of stakeholders' 3 views on an organisation's actual and desired image an audit of all elements of corporate identity to determine if they are congruent with the desired image formulating a plan to adjust the corporate identity if necessary. It all seems simple enough. Clearly though, controlling identity is not simple or straightforward. So, before considering the management process, it is important to consider a range of questions and issues. Corporate strategy One of the key issues of corporate identity management is its role in achieving overall organisational strategic objectives. 4 The aim of a corporate identity plan is to determine and communicate a corporate identity to meet these future strategic objectives. For example, the Labour Party's introduction of a new corporate identity in the 1990s (involving the introduction of a new logo, a red rose, and a new name, New Labour) was linked to its overall strategic plan to modernise the party to make it electable. However, a number of thinkers in this area, most notably Grunig, would argue that the corporate identity management process should not just be designed to help implement a

predetermined strategy. Instead, strategy should be formulated partly in response to stakeholders' needs and views. 'Excellent' organisations (Grunig 1992), practising a twoway symmetric 5 approach to communication management, should adapt their corporate strategies according to publics' opinions identified through research. Indeed, many would argue that the Labour Party's strategic objective to modernise was formulated in response to research conducted into publics' perceptions of the party's image. 6 Symbolism Using cultural codes and associated meanings, designers choose particular colours, shapes and typefaces to provoke particular emotional responses or to connote particular meanings. For example, a serif typeface such as Times New Roman used in broadsheets (the 'quality' press) has connotations of tradition, longevity and quality. A sans serif typeface, favoured by the tabloids, is often deemed to invoke modernity. The controversy triggered by Labour's adoption of the red rose logo to replace the red flag illustrates the power of the symbol. The change in visuals was interpreted -97Questia, a part of Gale, Cengage Learning. www.questia.com Publication Information: Book Title: The Public Relations Handbook. Contributors: Alison Theaker - author. Publisher: Routledge. Place of Publication: New York. Publication Year: 2004. Page Number: 97.