Co-Orientation Theory

Co-orientation theory examines and identifies perceptual gaps on two levels, inside and outside an organization. More specifically, it detects perceptions about an issue among organizational members as well as among organizational insiders and outsiders and investigates their in-between relationships, such as their levels of actual agreement and perceived agreement. Co-orientation theory is an important concept in the study of corporate reputation as reputation is a sum of the perceptions that organizational stakeholders hold on certain organizational attributes. These sums can be either positive or negative. This entry discusses the concept of perceptions and perceptual gaps in organizations, the historical background of co-orientation theory, and how the theory is related to corporate reputation.

The concept of perceptions as well as perceptual gaps is very important in organizational ...