The Walls Between Government Relations, Public Affairs & PR Are Down. Corporate Affairs Is the Integrator.
I’ve spent nearly 30 years sitting in rooms where communications, policy and legal teams each had their own read on the same issue, and I’ve watched what happens when those reads don’t match. Today, the corporate org chart is catching up to what those of us who’ve worked inside these organizations have known for years: the walls are down. Companies are folding communications, public policy and government affairs into a single department under one roof, corporate affairs.
Silos equal corporate risk. I’ve seen it play out the same way more than once: what a company says, who it says it to and how it’s perceived by the public, regulators, lawmakers and media all need to live inside a single function, not scattered across teams that often work in their own siloes. When these teams don’t work together, they end up only viewing an issue or situation through their own narrow lens, while the audience they’re trying to reach sees the whole picture at once. The organizations that understand the intersection between policy and business strategy, and integrate around it, are the ones that see around corners instead of reacting when an issue or crisis escalates.
The Integrated Model
In my experience, corporate affairs works best as the place where reputation and brand strategy, executive positioning, crisis and issues management and stakeholder engagement come together into one united approach, rather than separate functions running in parallel.
Integration is what makes it possible to anticipate where a decision, a policy shift or a story is going to land before it gets there. Getting the right team in the room early shifts the work from cleaning up after the fact to shaping the response with one aligned message from the start. Integration lets you see the difference: a policy problem dressed up as bad press and a communications problem mistaken for a policy fight.
Reputation, regulation and stakeholder challenges are only going to become more multifaceted and complex. A more scrutinized regulatory environment, politically charged business climate and skeptical audiences are reason enough to to structure a team in a way that fosters knowledge-sharing and two-way communication.
Turn Pressure Into Advantage
ROKK started its Corporate Affairs practice to help clients build the internal alignment that is necessary to be successful in Washington. I have long believed, and seen first hand, that corporate America and Washington are intertwined, and that everything you do should have Beltway audiences in view. The stakes are high and the challenges are complicated.
Today’s leaders need counsel that has experience and moves at the speed of the news cycle to anticipate what is next. As a bipartisan firm, we help our clients operate across parties and audiences: media, policymakers, employees, investors and the public. None of these audiences stay in a single lane. Your communications and policy efforts should not either.
Get in touch with our team to learn more.
