Corporate Identity

Definitions

The concept of corporate identity first appeared in the 1950s and was first used in design studies. Much of the literature dealing with the concept since that time has also been distinctly practitioner driven and oriented. It is, however, a common complaint that there is a lack of consistent use of the concept of corporate identity, both in theory and in practice. Seemingly, the only thing that the literature on this notion has in common is the view that it implies something that symbolizes the organization as a whole. The plethora of meanings assigned to the concept is partly a consequence of how scholars within a wide range of disciplines increasingly have worked with it. Publications on corporate identity can be found in the literature from marketing, corporate communication, management, organizational communication, public relations, organizational theory, and psychology. One conclusion reached by many scholars is that corporate identity is a difficult concept that merits an interdisciplinary approach.

Despite the many different takes, most scholars agree that corporate identity is an externally oriented and mediated concept. From an organizational perspective, it is often defined through the question “Who or what do we say we are?” It has to do with how an organization presents itself in public, and it deals with the mental associations that an organization wants stakeholders to have about it. In other words, the articulation of a corporate identity is a management task and is tied to a managerial perspective. A distinction is often made between corporate identity and organizational identity, the latter being seen as an internally oriented concept. Organizational identity focuses on what all members of an organization think the organization is about. The question an organization might ask is “Who or what are we?”

Corporate identity is influenced primarily by management's articulation of the vision and mission for the organization. Organizational identity, on the other hand, is influenced primarily by the perceptions, feelings, and thoughts about the organization held by its members or employees. Still, these two entities, corporate identity and organizational identity, should be seen as having a dialectical relationship. Management will often influence the organizational identity when offering up symbols that are internalized and used by the members or employees. On the other hand, management will also need to grasp and build on the organizational identity in order to formulate a corporate identity that can be rooted in the organization and that the members feel are relevant to their own experience of the organization. As pointed out by many scholars, however, the strict division between external and internal stakeholders does not necessarily do justice to the situation of an organization because such boundaries often are blurred.

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