02 Oct BMC blog: Why your reputation matters most
Whatever the shape and size of your organisation – be it an enterprise, business, public service, government even – the most important characteristic you need is integrity. Lose your reputation and you lose everything.
That’s why you are ill-advised to stake your chips on a gamble. Usually.
The long summer Tory leadership and de facto Prime ministerial campaign slogan boasted In Liz We Truss. Yet within days of taking up office, trust was the first credential new PM Liz Truss carelessly tossed aside.
Trust in the stewardship of the economy, faith in prudent leadership, governance that puts people first and money making second.
Let’s face facts, Liz Truss and her newly found government had no public mandate for a complete change of tack. Her party had campaigned on a wholly different agenda back in 2019. She had the votes of 80,000 Conversative Party members. Hardly the ‘aspiration generation’ she claims to appeal to.
What could possibly go wrong? A so-called mini budget with major implications, that’s what.
Announcing a series of swingeing tax cuts that are dependent on unprecedented government borrowing to prop up a philosophy explicitly designed to make the rich richer and poor (already clobbered by rising fuel and energy bills) poorer.
Complete faith in trickledown economics – a philosophy which, at best where tried elsewhere, has a sketchy track record. In other words, a huge gamble at a time when caution would seem more sensible.
No problems, then?
Yet no sooner had new chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng sat down from his first visit to the despatch box than the markets delivered their own immediate verdict.
Dealing in hard cold financial facts and forecast rather than the merits of political philosophy, they expressed little faith that the British government could deliver on its promises, pay back its loans and would likely leave its citizens with a millstone around their necks for generations to come.
Risk is not a word markets like to hear.
Worse was to come. With breathtaking arrogance, the British government refused to comment for the next five days as the Bank of England (which was forced to take action to protect sterling and help to save people’s mortgages, livelihoods and pensions) and the International Monetary Fund delivered their own damning verdict about a new British government that neither seemed to care – that’s why ‘no comment’ is so often construed as ‘can’t be arsed’ – or bothered to either to explain its rationale or calm frayed nerves.
A basic premise of effective media crisis management is to take ownership of any situation you find yourself in, regardless of cause or blame. Making comment isn’t an option, it’s an obligation. To shirk and to hide reveals much about your (lack of) character. Let’s call it what it is – cowardice.
After five days of hiding, Liz Truss emerged blinking into the sunlight with a round of local radio interviews which she assumed would be easy meat.
It failed spectacularly. Expressing no remorse for having triggered such appalling market conditions, Truss assumed her ‘get out of jail’ card was to suggest there were no other options and to blame Vladimir Putin. Sashaying her way around the budgetary chaos caused in recent days she inaccurately inferred that most people would have their energy bills capped at £2,500. They won’t.
By this time the public had made up their own mind. Her credibility shot, successive opinion polls gave the resurgent Labour Party unprecedented poll leads ranging anywhere from 17 to 34 percent, leaving Keir Starmer now looking like a Prime Minister in waiting.
Quite a week and a masterclass in how not to handle a crisis, not least one of your own making.
The result is many political pundits now predicting Truss will be lucky to see the year through, let alone next spring or onto the next general election.
How you act in a crisis – the words you say and the actions you take – are the cornerstones to maintaining your reputation, credibility and integrity.
While it’s easy to find fault in the way public figures behave, this is precisely how many leaders routinely run the businesses they own – then seem surprised when their customers, contacts and clients, let along colleagues, employees and suppliers lose faith in them.
An inability to communicate clearly and responsibly when faced with difficulty usually lies at the heart of the matter. They are not response-able, which is a no-no, not least in today’s rapid fire social media world where your reputation can be shredded in minutes if not seconds.
It matters. You reputation matters. Always.
Reputation Matters is the theme of October’s Business Media club meeting on Friday, October 28th from 10am to midday, when we will provide a step by step guide on how to cope with an unfolding media crisis.
For further information visit our Business Media Club page.
To book your seat for this meeting visit our Eventbrite page.
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