沃尔玛声誉危机的警示

    近几周来，沃尔玛的日子可不太好过。

    10月，就在这家全球最大的零售业巨头庆祝开业50周年时，12个州的沃尔玛（Wal-Mart）员工举行大规模罢工，抗议东家的不公平待遇。这场黑色星期五罢工可能致使沃尔玛的营业额损失上百万美元，更别提对其品牌的进一步损害了。

    沃尔玛的一位发言人把10月罢工贬称为“作秀”。与此同时，一家搜罗了大量在岗和离职员工吐槽抱怨的视频、名为“Walmart at 50”的网站却引发网友疯传。

    对一家企业来说，无论它是拥有成千上万的雇员，还是只有十几个人的小团队，公司内部的怨声载道都可能愈演愈烈，最终让公司声誉受损。对此，公司领导层必须应对有方。公关公司万博宣伟（Weber Shandwick）对企业领导层所做的一项调研表明，公司市值的63%与声誉密切相关。另据经济学人智库（Economist Intelligence Unit study）近期开展的一项研究，公司声誉受损带来的风险几乎是恐怖主义和自然灾害所带来的风险的三倍。

    布莱恩特大学（Bryant University）的管理学教授迈克尔·罗伯托给出的建议是：“在公司内部建立一个社交媒体平台是很有价值的，这样员工就能在这上面沟通交流，发发牢骚。如果没这个平台，那些想吐槽的员工就没有在公司内部发泄的渠道了。”

    罗伯托还建议，拥有一套明确的外部社交媒体政策，也能让那些对公司高层有怨言的人找到发泄之地。他解释说：“我们总是认为员工知道哪些行为是不可容忍的，但有时候他们其实并不知道。”他还表示，有些网民习惯把自己所有生活细节都发布在Facebook和Twitter上，这些人可能需要一些指导。

    去年，黑莓手机制造商RIM公司（Research In Motion）的一位高层员工绕过管理层，发布了一封致前联合首席执行官吉姆·巴尔斯利和麦克·拉扎里迪斯的公开信。这封信并没有抨击公司，相反，该员工提出了一个满怀激情的复兴计划，要使这家公司重获竞争力。可是，公司高层的反应却出人意料地不冷不热，只是再次重申了公司的财务状况是如何可靠。结果，这种态度让其他牢骚满腹的员工发出了更多公开信。

    It's been a tough few weeks for Wal-Mart.

    As the world's largest retailer celebrated its 50th year in business in October, workers in 12 states walked off the job in a wave of protest aimed at unfair employment practices. And the specter of a Black Friday protest could cost the retailer millions in lost revenue, not to mention more damage to its brand.

    A Wal-Mart (WMT) spokesperson dismissed the October strike as a "publicity stunt," as a website dubbed "Walmart at 50," which features a slew of video testimonies from current and former disgruntled staff, went viral.

    Whether a business has a workforce that numbers in the millions or just a handful of staffers, it's important for company leaders to have a plan to deal with reputation damage that can stem from rumblings within the ranks. A Weber Shandwick survey of business executives revealed that 63% of a company's market value is tied to its reputation. According to a recent Economist Intelligence Unit study, reputation risk is nearly three times greater than the risk of terrorism and natural disaster.

    "There's value in having an internal social media platform where employees can communicate, grumble, and gripe," advises Michael Roberto, a management professor at Bryant University. "When you don't have that, then you leave employees who want to vent about something with no internal option."

    Roberto suggests that having a clear external social media policy and training could also redirect complaints to company leaders. "We often believe employees know what's acceptable and what isn't and sometimes they don't," he explains. Digital natives used to posting every detail of their lives on Facebook and Twitter may need some guidance, he says.

    A high-level employee at BlackBerry-maker Research In Motion (RIMM) bypassed management and published an open letter to former co-CEOs Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis last year. Rather than trash the company, the employee delivered an impassioned prescription for making the mobile phone maker competitive again. The executives' response was to restate the strength of the company balance sheet in tepid corporate prose, which only prompted more open letters from other dissatisfied staffers.