Faces of companies: Personalization of corporate coverage in crisis and non-crisis periods

Abstract

Journalists need to make complex economic issues comprehensible for their readers. One possibility to do so is using personalization and putting company representatives (e.g. CEO, spokesperson) instead of the company as an organization in the focus of their work. Especially in times of crisis, the use of personalization could increase because crises are often associated with great uncertainty and complexity. Therefore, this study examines personalization in corporate coverage during crisis and non-crisis periods. To this end, we analyzed the coverage of four different German print media before, during, and after six selected corporate crises using a quantitative content analysis. The study shows that journalists focus more on internal stakeholders of companies at times of crisis compared to non-crisis periods. In general, the internal stakeholders journalists focus on are the CEOs as well as members of the board and supervisory board. Interestingly, in times of crisis, the coverage about the CEO declines, whereas the members of the board and supervisory board receive more attention.