Organization- public Relationships
Especially for the cost-reduction factor it is important to have a good organization-public relationship (Jahansoozi, 2007). It is in the interest of the organization that they have a good relationship with their publics. According to Jahansoozi there are different types of relationships: exchange relationships which are characterized by the exchange of benefits of both parties; communal relationships in which the parties provide each other with altruistic benefits; covenantal relationships where both parties act for the common good; exploitative relationships where no reciprocal relationships takes place and last but not least the contractual relationships which are characterized as being legal agreements with agreed roles and responsibilities (Jahansoozi, 2007). Jahansoozi (2007) stated that the communal relationships are the ideal ones. I do not agree with that, because I don’t think that in economic sector it is possible to have an altruistic relation. Even if they would have this altruistic relation this would not make any sense because this can never be good for their financial benefit. Further in Psychology there is a great debate whether altruistic behavior exists. I do not think it exists; you never act without any reason. In addition you cannot say that (here) the exchange relationship is not ideal, because it may result in an exploitative relationship. Then it is no longer an exchange relationship, so you cannot say this. I do understand that it is negative when the exchange relationship results in an explorative relationship but for me this is the ideal relationship and they should develop methods or contracts where this shift to an exploitative relationship cannot happen.
I agree that trust should be the most important characteristic in the organization public relationships (Jahansoozi, 2007). Without trust it is impossible to develop commitment, satisfaction, control mutuality and dialogue. I think the author underestimated the role of transparency. We are talking about organizations and not friendship; to get trust the organizations should be as transparent as possible, the more transparency the more trust. I think it takes a long time and effort to get trust. When the organization and the public trust each other the above mentioned characteristics will emerge. I think the degree of commitment, satisfaction, control mutuality and dialogue define what kind of relationship it is.
I think the main challenges in relationship management are to establish a reciprocal relationship with financial benefit for both parties and to keep a good reputation with regard to environmental and social responsibility. I think the reciprocal relationship is not possible if all parties want to have financial benefit. There is always one who wants to get more money or has in general different goals than the other one. The importance of environmental responsibility increased in the last years, especially with the growing fear of climate change and the growing popularity of environment protection. The social responsibility is also very important because like in environment protection there is an increase of interest in this field of the general population. Good reputation is very important for the public, customers, employees and investors. Without them an organization cannot exist. To get a good reputation the relationship with the public is very important; they can represent the organization and influence other people. You have to have a good reputation to get contacts and positive press to get investors. The investors are the ones who should be persuaded why its profitable for them to invest money.
Analysis of the reputation of Mercedes Benz
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I will analyze the reputation of Mercedes Benz with the help of Employees, Investments, Products, Ethical- Environmental factors and Customers and with a conclusion at the end.
I think that Mercedes Benz has a good reputation in the eyes of employees, this year they have recruited 1.000 employees for the Mercedes Benz factory in Wörth, Germany and 600 employees in the factory in Untertürkheim, Germany (Daimler AG, 2011). This shows that there are a lot of people who wants to work for them and that their economy is very good at the moment. Daimler says that they sold 120.982 cars within one month worldwide. The last quartile of 2011 was the best sold in the history of their company; an accretion of 7, 3% (Daimler AG, 2011). This shows that they should have satisfied customers. At the beginning I talked about trust, that trust is the most important characteristic of the organization- public relationship. Mercedes Benz has a new customer; Transports Publics Genevois (TPG) from the Switzerland. From September 2011 Mercedes Benz delivers 87 new articulated busses to Switzerland. Further Mercedes Benz for the second time in a row got the award of customer satisfaction 2011 (Daimler, 2011). As I said, environment protection is an increasing topic where the customers are interested in. Daimler got an award for inventing new fuel cells for cars which drive with electricity. Additional they designed a prototype of a truck which drives with sugar cane diesel.
In conclusion I think it is difficult to analyze the reputation of an organization. As I described above Mercedes Benz seems to have a good reputation; this year the recruited a lot of new employees and they got a big new deal with a company from Switzerland. I think in general Mercedes Benz is viewed as producing better quality products which are more expensive than many other companies, for example Volks Wagen (VW) or Opel. But there are always customers which are not satisfied. I think when it’s about reputation of a company; the most important factor is their sales figures. At the end this is what is important for the company and this is where you can see how many people are satisfied with their products. In conclusion I think Mercedes Benz Germany has a good reputation.
Literature:
Daimler AG. (2011). Nachrichten: Unternehmen. http://www.daimler.com/konzern/nachrichten
Jahansoozi, J. (2007). Organization- public relationships: An exploration of the Sundre Petroleum Operators Group. Public Relations Review , S. 398-406.
Tirkkonen, P. (04. October 2011). Lecture. Identity and image, Reputation and image theories, Crisis communication . Tallinn, Estonia.
I am strongly agree with you about the trust part. There must be many people who has never driven Mercedes Benz but if you ask them about a Mercedes car, they do not say any negative things because that company has a good reputation in the world and the first reason is trust i think. As you said, it can be expensive but always satisfactory.
AntwortenLöschenI agree with you both. In addition to this I think Mercedes-Benz became kinda 'luxury' brand in many countries so it is even could represent your higher status in a society. This one of the biggest reasons why people buy it.
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