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INTRODUCTION
McDonalds For many people, that simple word is likely to trigger a host of thoughts and feelings. For example, if asked to identify symbols associated with McDonalds, they would likely say Golden Arches, Ronald McDonald and the Big Mac. Asked about the nutritional value of its food, some might state that the food is high in fat and calories, and that it is bad for one's diet. Asked to offer a business assessment, it might be that McDonalds is the premium fast-food business franchise that employs adolescents to serve inexpensive, simple meals quickly; that it is greasy and low-wage; or that it is well organized and profitable, occupying a distinctive niche in the panoply of fast-food stores. Moreover, McDonalds is likely to trigger certain definite expectations about the kind of experiences one would have in any of its stores. In short, in the minds of many, one word is likely to evoke a variety of images, beliefs, attitudes, opinions and expectations.
More generally, people have cognitions and emotions about the organizations and institutions with which they deal (Elsbach, 2006). Those cognitions will, no doubt, systematically vary depending on whether one is looking at an organization as an investor, regulator, supplier, consumer or potential employee. Further, research consistently shows that people's cognitions affect how they deal with an organization and its members (see Walker, 2010, for a summary). In short, the cognitions that people have of organizations are real and have real consequences. Reputation is a term that has been applied to certain types of cognitions of organizations. As reputation does affect actions and outcomes, finding ways to shape if not manage reputation becomes a particularly important concern for managers. In order to manage reputation, though, it must first be understood - or measured - in some way. Yet it is at this point that difficulties arise, because the measurement of organizational reputation suffers from several substantial problems, beginning with lack of an accepted definition. Without a clear definition, measurement procedures are problematic, gathered data are questionable, and theory is weakened.
There has as yet been no systematic work to integrate the related issues of conceptualization and methodology into a workable set of guidelines for measuring organizational reputation. This paper attempts to redress that gap...