BOOK REVIEWS published December 2004  Take advantage of the Christmas break and catch up on your reading! This issue we have reviewed three books for you.   Corporate Social Opportunity! Seven steps to make corporate social responsibility work for your business By David Grayson and Adrian Hodges, Greenleaf Publishing, (July 2004). Grayson and Hodges deliver a book about how to improve corporate performance and gain competitive advantage. The authors argue that the current rationale for why companies should practise corporate social responsibility needs to shift. Currently, the rationale for CSR seems to be based on risk mitigation; Grayson and Hodges say this should shift to one that recognises the opportunities CSR provides for the development of new products and services, new markets and new business models. With examples from 200 companies, the authors use their position working with leaders of global businesses and of local communities, to outline both in theory and practice a seven-step process companies can apply to assess the implications of CSR on their business strategy and identify their own corporate social opportunities. Corporate Social Opportunity! by the authors of the best-selling Everybody’s Business moves the argument from the ‘why’ to the ‘how’. Involvement in CSR often poses apparently conflicting demands, which require the application of judgement, guided by a clear sense of overall direction and corporate purpose. This book is designed to guide a business through such dilemmas and complex decisions. Grayson and Hodges challenge the common belief that CSR projects result in little revenue for the participating company. Instead, they explain how companies adopting stringent social, ethical  and environmental standards find that they create largely untapped opportunities for product innovation, market development and non-traditional business models. Available on www.amazon.com Brand Warfare: 10 rules for building the killer brand By David D’Alessandro et al, McGraw-Hill Education - Europe (2002). A book likely to be enjoyed by all in PR, D’Alessandro attacks advertising agencies, clients and lawyers. Writing with the experience of his position (CEO of John Hancock, a Fortune 500 company) and background in public relations, he illustrates the text with a number of anecdotes with which even junior practitioners will be able to identify. D’Alessandro says the importance of a strong brand is widely understood, but “nothing is as misunderstood in American business as the question of how to use it”. He argues that businesses “routinely milk” their brands without investing in them, extend their brands without canvassing consumer opinion, purchase valuable brands in “merge and purge binges”, and then discard the brand names in favour of corporate control. The book criticises executives who believe a strong brand will substitute for an inferior product. However, D’Alessandro believes the opposite is true, stating that such companies have to work harder and be better than anyone else because they have a reputation to uphold. Brand Warfare makes the claim that often, despite lip-service being paid to the concept of branding, the entire infrastructure of most corporations is hostile to brand building. Individuals apply their own agenda to any branding efforts; such as the lawyers who slow down a company’s response in a crisis because they believe that short-term liability issues out-weigh long-term brand considerations. Or the clerks who allow scandals to brew because they see little point in reporting the small indiscretions they uncover. Then there are those in finance who allow good brands to die because they resent the dollars it takes to build a brand. Finally, there are the advertising managers who spend millions on campaigns that fail to appeal to consumers because they don’t understand that the brand drives advertising and not the other way around. D’Alessandro imparts to readers the wisdom: “Brand is everything, the stuff you want to communicate to consumers and the stuff you communicate despite yourself”. Available at Angus and Robertson Creating the Corporate Soul: The rise of public relations and corporate imagery in American big business By Roland Marchand, University of California Press, (November 1998). Around the turn of the century--long before corporations cared about such things as public image, society cowered beneath the shadows cast by monster companies. The soulless corporation, residing in monolithic skyscrapers and populated by army-sized staffs, was defended by smug men like J.P. Morgan, who believed he owed "the public nothing." One depression and a world war later, corporations began to realise the value of connecting with the people. By recasting themselves as "good neighbours". businesses proved to consumers that they posed no threat to democracy or the American way. Written by a university professor specialising in cultural history, Creating the Corporate Soul provides a brilliant look at this transformation, showing how public relations performed the ultimate make-over. The book combines business history and cultural history as it follows the quest of corporate executives to wrap their enterprises in the imagery of familiarity, intimacy and neighbourliness. Marchand has filled his carefully researched book with entertaining print ads and interesting case studies (including General Motors and General Electric); it shows the reader the power of public relations and a corporate image. This book is a must read for anyone interested in business, technology, consumer culture and advertising in the twentieth century. Available at Angus and Robertson

PR Influences Australian Public Relations Newsletter. Article: PR Review: Brand Warfare 10 rules for building the killer brand. Information Content: Book Reviews & Information