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The authors distinguish between two kinds of community: consumption and companion communities. It is known that the consumption community encompasses consumers and their interactions in acquiring, using, modifying, and disposing of a specific brand or product category. In contrast, the companion community comprises marketers and their network partners who nurture and enable the consumption community by providing necessary resources such as brands and services, as well as meanings that accompany these brands. Focusing on the particular companion community that promotes and generates meanings for hybrid cars, the authors find that the meaning of sustainability constructed within this community is self-focused: manufacturers contend that they have become "sustainable" because they admit their guilt about acting destructively towards the natural environment and marginally improving the situation. This is a subtle controversy and its implication for consumers is clear. Instead of seeing the hybrid car as the paragon of absolute sustainability and a signal to consume more, consumers should regard it as a monument to industrial wastefulness. ARTICLE Introduction In the marketplace, communities are formed on the basis of consumption practices and brand interests. In particular, brands are said to be a means of consumer bonding. In the same way, we argue that brands unite marketers into what we call companion communities. The companion community stands for marketer-affiliated individuals who enable consumer community development and operation through the provision of physical, financial, cultural, and symbolic resources. Traditionally, researchers have seen marketers as an external factor separate from consumer communities. We argue that both consumption and companion communities are closely intertwined so that they represent two aspects of the same wider social system. Neither community exists without the other. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how meanings are formed within companion communities. To do this, we first compare two contrasting conceptual perspectives: mechanist and constructivist. Then we theoretically explain how communities of consumption and companion communities are related. Next we describe the method of investigation. Results are presented and discussed. In the final section, we discuss conclusions and implications. Interpretive Worldview The concepts of system and community are related. The common definition of a system is that it comprises elements (e.g., individuals) and their relationships. Similarly, community is seen as a group of members and their relationships. This similarity between the two definitions is not coincidental. It is rooted in the tradition that we call mechanical systems thinking. Mechanical Systems Perspective People coming across complex social happenings often try to simplify them in order to grasp their essence. A person who uses the metaphor of a machine to understand community or system is more likely to have mechanical thinking patterns. Machines are made up of individual components that work and mesh together. Similarly, from this perspective, community can be seen as the aggregation of participating individuals and their actions. Researchers are also prone to such simplification. Some discuss a small group of friends as an example of community, and others consider community to represent the aggregation of brand users. Second, it is a challenge to explain why individuals act as a cohesive group when they are part of community, while economic theory emphasises that they should operate as individuals who seek to maximise their own utility and minimise costs. If a particular community is made up of individuals, then problems such as "the tragedy of commons" should arise. The tragedy of commons metaphor highlights how individual actions can undermine the long-term interests of society: individual members of society maximise their own well-being by using more and more of natural resources while together they might completely destroy the replenishing capacity of nature and thus compromise the very source of their well-being. …

Even after 40 years of philosophical discussions about whether “customer” terminology is appropriate in the context of education, health care, religion, government, and other social institutions, virtually no research has been conducted to identify actual public attitudes on the subject. Thus, a large-scale, five-country study was conducted to examine the question: Should patients, students, news media readers/viewers/listeners, political constituents, and members of religious organizations be treated as “customers”? In addition to collecting and analyzing quantitative responses, the study explored the reasoning behind respondents' attitudes, provided benchmark data for future research, and highlighted critical implications for both public and private policy.

This article examines the principles and practices of the marketing system within corporate social responsibility and sustainable development frameworks to argue that responsible marketing and sustainable marketing are not synonymous ideas. The article identifies misleading assumptions about progress through economic growth and preference satisfaction and highlights the issues to be confronted by marketers to fully address the social and ecological crisis of destructive overconsumption. The basic rationale for the developmental welfare marketing course of action is outlined, and this systemic policy is distinguished from the conventional appropriative form of managerial marketing. A radical new logic for marketing as a social process requiring thinking beyond the discipline is called for. The result of this review is an agenda for a sustainable society purpose and form for marketing, part of a catalytic movement, outlined in an emergent set of transdisciplinary propositions that reflect disillusionment with current values and beliefs.

PurposeRational modes of decision‐making, followed by communication of the decision to stakeholders, leading to implementation of the decision is taken as a given in most management theories. The role of corporate communication managers in many cases is to support this process via standard communication tools. This study aims to challenge the efficacy of this model by drawing on discourse and strategy‐as‐practice perspectives in order to explain the link between managed communication and performance in terms of enacting decisions.Design/methodology/approachFollowing an ethnographic case study approach, the research analyses communication discourse at Intech, a major international conglomerate based in Germany. Data was collected over a period of 15 months, structured and thematic analysis conducted, supported by ATLAS.ti computer‐aided qualitative data analysis software. Methods of discourse analysis were applied in order to explain concrete practices.FindingsA key contribution is to provide a framework that enables researchers and practitioners to understand in‐depth the setting in which decision‐related communication takes place, as recently demanded by Suchan and Charles (2006). Three critical fields of action for effective communication and strategy implementation are identified: giving decisions voice; facilitating the legitimisation process for decisions; and developing alternatives to cascading as a mode of decision implementation.Research implications/limitationsResearchers may adopt the alternative view of corporate communication proposed and test or apply it in further case studies or in more large‐scale, perhaps quantitatively oriented research projects across companies and cultural boundaries.Practical implicationsFor practitioners, a key challenge lies in implementing modes of legitimisation into managed communication.Originality/valueThis paper makes the case for an alternative approach to enacting decisions via practices of managed communication, based on the insights gained from the Intech case.

Recently, major projects have been conducted using a strategic alliance set‐up, where participating organisations work together, collaboratively, within the same organisation structure consisting of personnel from each organisation. The ethos of the strategic alliance encourages an integrated, unified working environment. A study of the communication networks in a major strategic alliance project was undertaken in November 2000. This involved conducting a communication audit that included five unstructured interviews. Participants included a broad range of project team members, matched to some of Belbin’s team role profiles. The paper discusses the principal factors affecting internal communication, as revealed from the analysis of the interview data.

The practice of tele‐ or home‐working, has been adopted by an increasing number of companies and workers in response to the changing economic and social needs that characterise the world of work today. Working from home brings new challenges as well as benefits, and a variety of studies have examined the impact of tele‐working in terms of such benefits and costs. Few studies, however, have focused on the emotional impact that working away from the office may have on workers as they cope with new technologies, reduced support, increased social isolation and other changes. This neglect of the feelings of workers reflects a somewhat wider neglect in the arena of emotion at work in general. The present study aims to redress this balance through a qualitative pilot study that examines the changing emotions that tele‐workers experience. The implications of the study for tele‐workers and managers are outlined.

The inter‐organizational network is becoming an increasingly common form of organization. The majority of trade is carried out between organizations, rather than organizations and households. Many of these networks are concerned with the exchange of tangible goods. However, increasing numbers are concerned with the exchange of knowledge and all are dependent upon the role of knowledge in their activities. It is our assertion that with an understanding of the nature of knowledge, we may identify how, and why, certain network formations are adopted. It is asserted that links between organizations may be viewed as knowledge assets. The expression of multiple links within a corporate community may be regarded as a network of knowledge assets. From this conceptual framework, it may be possible to answer wider questions concerning the nature of networks established in the real world and how changes are wrought on a network over a period of time.

Management literature is critically examined, and this finds an outmoded conception of human communication that is convenient when power is the central concern, but dysfunctional when constructive decision making is needed. Communication is widely taken to be the transmission of information and the reproduction of intended meanings. This view is premised on ancient classical assumptions of causality and linearity — of absolute and classifying categories, instead of relative and relational categories. Such a basis introduces intentions and causality into our understanding of communication. This reductionist thinking is seen vividly in stimulus‐response models of human influence that do not adequately explain human interaction. The critique examines social constructionist thinking that sees the world as a complex set of interrelated social phenomena constructed by people in interaction, ie in joint social action. A wealth of constructive thinking is discovered in Nordic, Germanic and Eastern sociologies and social philosophies. This is an alternative to the Western psychological perspective that is dominant and misleading in management thinking. Circular (transactional), rather than linear, models are more helpful in understanding human communication and what is required for responsive and responsible management of communication for productive business enterprise. Causal assumptions can be discarded in taking a view of communication in and of corporations (ie ‘corporative communication’) as both stimulator and stabiliser. Social, political and cultural phenomena can be more richly understood, however, if their linguistic and discursive (interactive) nature is addressed with a constructionist perspective on social reality. Communication cannot be understood without reference to knowledge, understanding, information, meaning and sense. A social constructionist theory of communication is a widened framework for the analysis of communication in a complex and holistic fashion.

This paper explores the integration of corporate and marketing communication in tomorrow’s company, and discusses a model of the corporate communication system of managing. It defines the need for a total stakeholder perspective and to integrate communication activities around constituent‐constituent relationships. Marketing is described as a special case of human communication, in which all elements of the marketing mix are seen as communicative in action. The paper agrees with the Tomorrow’s Company study that inclusion is a necessity, and argues that new management involves a form of economic democracy, which in turn creates a need for new forms of corporate governance, monitoring, and management. This will require managers to re‐evaluate the appropriateness of their thinking. The corporate communication model of systemic managing is forwarded for this purpose

Internal marketing has been of interest to practitioners and academics, in marketing and other disciplines of management, for some years, and published papers focus on definitions, the role of internal marketing in organisations, and various empirical investigations. Discusses the elements of a broadened concept on internal marketing, which emerges from: a systematic review and examination of the existing literature; case study material; “expert” opinion from leading academics; and interviews with managers.

The concept of relationship marketing is established in the general management and marketing literature. Almost all of the thinking and practice has emanated exclusively from marketing scholars and practitioners. A contribution towards better understanding the communication issues is presented by re‐considering the nature of managed human communication as a fundamental management function, and a re‐consideration of the social nature and function of human relationships. This requires recognition that the field of public relations also deals with relationships. Some implications for individual managers are identified which do not depend on the scgmentalist functional view of marketing as an economic tool of persuasion. As communication occurs within the context of the communicators' multiplex relationships and relational roles, and these relationships define how to interpret the content of communication episodes, business managers can benefit from awareness of the impact of relationship status on the communication process and of communication events on their relationships.

The authors examine the nature of marketing in the public sector as a response to government-led reforms during the past 15 years. They conclude that the public sector is a context in which marketing management differs in both theory and application from the approaches found in profit-oriented, privately-owned organizations. There are elements of commercial marketing theory and practice that are useful at an operational level in public bodies, but the democratic process is a major complication. The development of a new framework for marketing in the special context of public services is urged and a tentative start is attempted.

Offers an account of communication improvement in a UK public service organisation, as part of a strategic review and re‐organisation for improved service delivery, and, with communication identified as a strategic issue during a corporate strategy development exercise, shows how a task force was initiated to drive forward some essential improvements. Discusses ways of managing the inherited approach and the development of a more responsive approach, and details an internal market orientation model which was developed and piloted. Lists benefits secured from the application of the model during a period of strategic change and describes further developments, including the implementation of standards of communication and board briefing systems. Compares the traditional employee communication and internal market orientation approaches.

Where does expertise and responsibility for strategic business communication lie? Marketing and public relations vie for supremacy since both groups specialize in communication, using managed communications to pursue their respective objectives. Convincing arguments for one being subsumed by the other abound. A clarifying discussion of the often-confused vocabulary is the starting point for a review of the nature and role of marketing and public relations and how they are portrayed in respective textbooks. The emerging total management system of corporate communication and its relationship to marketing and public relations is placed in a framework for the integration of corporate strategy, organizational development, human resource management, public relations and marketing. Corporate communication has a dominant role in achieving organizational growth, by being concerned with learning, showing the corporation to itself and as a mode of organization for both external and internal environments. (The term c...

A postal survey of directors and managers of corporate communications, communications, public relations, human resource management and marketing was con‐ducted among over 1,000 UK organizations, resulting in the views of over 200 directors and managers being captured and reported. The survey was conducted by members of a UK university research unit which focuses or the development of the emerging field of corporate communications management and the survey was spon‐sored by the UK Chapter of the International Association of Business Communicators. Collates and interprets the data generated in order to explicate a snap‐shot view of the structure, operation, and evolution of the embryonic management field of corporate communications. Researchers recognized that many practitioners are working ahead of any major developments in significant underpinning principles of theory. The needs and possibili‐ties for future development of the field were to be exam‐ined from the results of the study.

The common view of communication is of something that is not really communication. To be effective, communication effort must be seen in its holistic social context, and be managed — planned, co‐ordinated, integrated — and understood. Modern organisational communication, ie interpersonal communication in an organisational setting, must be recognised as a social integrator rather than as a mechanistic management tool. This requires managers to hold a particular concept of interpersonal communication. Evidence of the prevailing concept is provided, a more appropriate view is discussed, and a research agenda is outlined.

Studies of national images and identities suggest a careful consideration of historical and contextual aspects when planning, mastering and evaluating corporate images and identities — including a classification of image types. We argue for a reconsideration of these contributions if corporate communication is to be other than auto-communication, fixes or acronyms. Our discussion draws on company examples such as Hamburg-Mannheimer, Ramboll, Shell, Burger King and Scandinavian Airlines.

Whilst many proponents of “interactive communication” and “social interaction” do not see the concept as problematic, they focus attention on practices. I choose to re-examine both “interaction” and “communication,” and to relate these concepts to the concepts of society and organisation/corporation1. The concept of “interaction” is examined, and social interaction is considered as exchange. The patterning of social interaction in markets, bureaucracies, solidarity groupings, and co-operative collectives, and their respective core values are considered. The “organization” is explained as a complex dynamic interaction system. An alternative sociological analysis of the social is compared with that of the social psychology tradition. Communication is discussed as a mode of interaction, to reveal monologic and dialogic conceptions of communication. Conclusions are raised around the themes of “interactive communication,” IT, and dialogue and appreciation in a society constituted by interaction. Interaction, it is concluded, requires presence, whereas ICT allows absence.

This conceptual paper examines the need for deliberative public decision making to create a sustainable society, and the potential for social learning and public decision making in the online collective intelligence. Concepts and evidence are synthesised from studies of sustainability, decision-making, communication, deliberative democracy, knowledge management, and information and communication technology. The future of the relationship between humans, society, and nature is being co-constructed, and ICT may act to improve or to diminish the quality of this relationship. Further understanding of the potential of ICT to enable and support public/social learning and democratic decisions on courses of action will be a signpost to a pathway to a sustainable future. The synthesis of understandings from sustainable development, communication, knowledge management, and online web domains creates a meta-level appreciation of converging issues facing humans and society in relation to nature. This is a contribution to understanding online communication for building a pathway out of crisis into a sustainable society.