January 2, 2019

“Setting expectations without an adequate plan for meeting them is a dangerous game…if you stumble, angry, disappointed stakeholders will make you pay a price.” 

“Like BP’s brand promise of being “beyond petroleum ,” like GE’s “imagination at work ” portrayal of solving the world’s problems, like Wells Fargo trumpeting its new ethical standards , Trump linked his own brand inextricably with the wall. Like those companies, he hadn’t thoroughly thought through what a commitment it meant, what expectations he would have to fulfill if elected, and how exactly he’d be able to deliver something he had no unilateral power to deliver.”

My firm is in the business of insuring corporations against reputational crises and has analyzed thousands of scenarios. As large companies and professional risk managers are realizing, reputation is based on the degree to which reality is in sync with expectations. Setting expectations without an adequate plan for meeting them is a dangerous game. You may be able to build a brand and market your products around some new vision, but eventually, if you stumble, angry, disappointed stakeholders will make you pay a price.”

January 2, 2019
USA Today

“Like Humpty Dumpty, the wall will be his (reputational) downfall.”

Reputation crisis comprises disappointment, diminished trust, and economic/political losses.

Reputations are valuable strategic intangible assets. Threats to these assets enterprise reputation risks, often mislabeled “brand risks” need to be managed, and management needs to be overseen through reputation risk governance lest reputational damage or reputational harm result in long-tailed go-forward losses in economic value and/or political power. Because these intangible risks arise from the interplay of stakeholder expectation, experiences, and media amplification, parametric insurances for intangible asset risks, for reputational value, for reputational harm, and for reputation assurance help mitigate risk by telling a simple, convincing and completely credible story of quality reputation governance to stakeholders. This story telling effect is the expressive power of insurance complementing insurance’s better known instrumental power of indemnification.

Risk management, risk financing in insurance captives, and risk transfer through reputation insurances comprise the constituent elements of a comprehensive solution. What’s your strategy?