9 June 2005
'Americans Need To Practice More Corporate Diplomacy Says New Across The Board Article'
In order to soften America’s image in the world, U.S. corporations must become de facto diplomats representing the nation, according to an article in the latest issue of Across the Board, The Conference Board’s magazine.
Says Gail Dutton, author of the article, “It would be foolish to hope for a surge of good feeling toward U.S. foreign policy anytime soon from Europeans and Canadians, but U.S. companies can’t afford to let public opinion toward them deteriorate further. It’s time to start thinking about corporate diplomacy and taking the lead in improving views of American companies and, along the way, America itself.”
The situation is far from hopeless. U.S. companies have enormous power to counter negative sentiments. A week after the South Asian tsunami in February, a poll by GMI (a Seattle-based market research company) of 20,000 consumers worldwide found 59 percent so pleased with American corporations’ relief efforts that their impressions of those companies’ brands had improved.
Four Troubling Trends
Negative perceptions of the United States took at least two decades to materialize, driven by controversial and sometimes-belligerent foreign policy and encroaching globalization heralded by iconic brands such as McDonald’s and Starbucks.
These perceptions will take at least as long to dissipate, and a number of other trends have spurred growing anti-Americanism:
• The worldwide goodwill toward America for its support of Allied powers during WWII has waned among all but the oldest generations.
• The image of the United States as a promised land—distant, exotic, and glamorous—has faded in the onslaught of familiarity with U.S. products, the media-portrayed image of America, and the vast numbers of people who have traveled here.
• Recent business scandals have eroded the honor and integrity of not just the likes of Enron and Andersen but the nation as a whole. The international business community has focused on the scandals themselves rather than on the fact that they have been brought to light and addressed.
• Many books and films, such as Fahrenheit 9/11, have portrayed aspects of America in a less-than-positive light.
Dutton says that U.S. corporations can no longer separate themselves from government politics. A GMI survey of 20,000 international consumers earlier this year found that 17 percent of responding companies would consciously avoid U.S. companies and products “because of discontent over U.S. military action and foreign policies.”
Source: “Grassroots Diplomacy,” May/June 2005 Across The Board, The Conference Board - www.conference-board.org |
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