A strategic organisation-stakeholder relationship-building model: an external organisational-orientated perspective

Abstract

To fill the gap in existing literature to build organisation-stakeholder relationships (OSRs) and to expand the body of knowledge on the process of OSR building, Slabbert (2012) developed a model that provided a partnership approach to describe the process of OSR building with strategic stakeholders. This model was tested among in-house corporate communication professionals at JSE listed organisations. The main aim of this article was to provide a follow-up study to further explore how the principles of this model resonate with the process of OSR building in practice, specifically in selected South African public relations (PR) and communication agencies. By further exploring the principles of the SISOSR model, this study explored whether OSR building from a modernistic perspective is still relevant in practice or whether it resembles a post-modernistic move evident in recent academic literature. A two-phased qualitative data collection approach was followed: Semi-structured one-on-one interviews were conducted with five senior PR professionals at South African PR agencies that had been selected as winners for specific PR campaigns during the 2013 PRISM awards; and a semi-structured one-on-one interview with the CEO of Business DNA, an agency specialising in guiding organisations in stakeholder relationship building and management. Although the findings indicated that the OSR-building process presented by Slabbert’s 2012 model is more conducive to in-house corporate communication professionals’ practices, it does tend to resonate with OSR building in practice which could be evident of communication professionals’ slow uptake of post-modernistic approaches. The findings of this research were used to provide guidelines for possible amendments of the SISOSR model to align it with OSR building in practice. This could be used as a starting point for future studies in addressing the process of stakeholder relationship building from a post-modern perspective.