Back in 2010 IPR published this post written by me titled, “Global Stakeholder Relationship Governance.” Four years later, Palgrave Macmillan has just published this new book, “Global Stakeholder Relationships Governance: An Infrastructure,” that includes, besides a good part of my post, other excellent contributions from Jim Grunig, Emilio Galli Zugaro and Joao Duarte.
How has my thinking process developed since that post developed and what is new in it?
I believe the novelty mostly consists in an investigation into the ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ components that go to form a ‘professional infrastructure’ in support of a more effective global stakeholder relationships process for the organization; in the identification of three fairly novel ‘hard’ components of that proposed infrastructure (the need for an organization’s distinct listening culture; the alignment of internal/external relations and communication; the implications of integrated reporting) besides possible indicators and arguments that lead me to imagine a progressive blending of the two traditional approaches to public relations: the still-dominant symbolic interpretive communicating-to and the emerging stakeholder relationship governance communicating-with ones. I believe these contents might be useful for CCOs in their day-to-day planning and implementation processes. (see fig. 1)
This said, the book has a declared intent to ‘move out’ of the traditional – even where advanced – public relations arguments and attract the attention of management, directors, business schools, CFOs, HRs, CSRs, and sustainability professionals, as well as scholars… toward the issue of the much needed improvement of the organization’s decision making process, by focusing on the need to listen to stakeholder expectations vis-a-vis each specific objective (instead of a generic lip service) and, by doing so, improve the quality and accelerate the implementation of those decisions.
From this perspective, the innovative contents of Emilio Galli Zugaro’s chapter on stakeholder listening; Joao Duarte’s insights on stakeholder mapping; and, last but certainly not least, Jim Grunig’s reassessment of the potential integration process of the two consolidated approaches to public relations, in light of recent body of knowledge, practice and technological developments, strongly support a significant institutionalization of the stakeholder relationships function in all organizations. A management book.
Toni Muzi Falconi is an adjunct professor at New York University and LUMSA University in Rome. He is also Senior Counsel to Methodos spa, the Italian change-knowledge management consultancy that operates in Milano and Rome. Falconi will be speaking on global stakeholder relationships at The Conference Board’s roundtable event on Feb 28.
