The adaptation of impression management and symbolic communication to counteract the loss of the company’s legitimacy

Purpose: Due to the increasing importance attached to how corporations attempt to build their legitimacies, it is not to be avoided to gain insight whether strategies they can implement can be assessed as being fair from the point of view of stakeholders. Because the way in which organizations communicate with stakeholders can be considered as being one of the sources of corporate legitimacy special attention should be paid to the level of sincerity and fairness in messages send to stakeholders by corporations. When analyzing the process of communication from this point of view symbols and symbolic management may become relevant factors. The paper determines circumstances under which corporations can use or resign from using impression management techniques, which is believed to be related to how they perceive both sources of their power over stakeholder (be it legitimacy or other established way of rendering stakeholders’ judgment about those corporations) and the level of uncertainty related to their operations carried out within given sectoral environment. Design/methodology/approach: The work is based on literature studies and critical review of hitherto established ways of analyzing symbolic management and its possible impact on how corporations take part in communication process aimed at legitimacy building. Findings: Research propositions have been built based on analysis that reveals how organizational failures in carrying out activities related to indicated types of legitimacy are expected to impact on the probability of making use of impression management techniques. Research limitations/implications: Limited number of types of legitimacy has been taken into account. Practical implications: Because impression management techniques may lead companies to problems with building relationships with stakeholders, companies need to take care of when they could be more inclined to use those techniques. Then in spite of greater probability that those techniques may be implemented, companies may decide on more sincere communication. Originality/value: The approaches to problems related to impression management techniques should allow for showing that in addition to phenomena like legitimacy or reputation, those related to stigmatization and disapproval appear to be significant when analyzing corporate communication. The communication when being symbolic not necessarily should be disregarded.