Corporate Communication and Public Relations

Communication is the lifeblood of all organisations: it is the means by which companies large and small access the vital resources they need to operate. Communication is at the heart of organisational performance. The success of an organisation's efforts to acquire resources and influence the environment in which it operates depends largely on how well and how professionally the company communicates with its resource holders. An organisation's communication system is the set of multiple tactical and strategic means of communication it relies on to communicate with its stakeholders, as well as the content of the message it chooses to disseminate through these means. The communication system encompasses marketing communications, public relations, investor relations and employee communications; it also includes the types of institutional communications an organisation makes that are created to influence the way issues are framed and the resulting public debate. In its broadest sense, it includes the initiatives that a company may undertake to demonstrate 'social responsibility', 'good citizenship' and its purpose. Systematically assessing the effectiveness of a company's communication structure and activities is one of the strategic levers. From a branding point of view, the role of an integrated communication system is to improve brand equity by establishing the brand in the memory of the observer, linking strong, favourable and unique associations to the brand and creating the motivation, ability and opportunity for stakeholders to process persuasive messages and retrieve brand information from memory when making a choice. Brand-related communications influence the meanings associated with the brand and create a brand image. Advertising and public relations increase brand awareness and the likelihood that a company's products and services, work or actions will be evoked by resource holders, influencing the perceived value of the brand and creating an image that influences how they view the company and its products.
The course programme is structured through the following macro topics:
-Communication as a strategic management lever to affirm the values and culture of the company, in the context of constantly changing scenarios (moving beyond the Ptolemaic vision and towards the individual-centric vision).
-Communication as a vector of the company's internal and external relations, according to the evolution of scenarios and the development of the role of influential interlocutors for the company and, in general, for the 'enlarged' society.
-The process of defining and affirming the distinctive communication positioning of the company and the brand: coherence and integration between the various communication disciplines.
-Identity and corporate personality - visibility and image - corporate reputation.
-The different branches of corporate communication: institutional, product, internal/organisational, public affairs, lobbying, financial, issue management (preparedness planning - crisis communication), social responsibility, business to business.
-The spread of digital technologies and the impact they have on corporate communication, also in terms of disintermediation.
-The porpuse and sense-making of business
-The evolution of civil society and corporate social responsibility (Sustainability - Corporate Social Responsibility - Cause Related Marketing).
-Criteria and methods for measuring and evaluating corporate communication and reputation.
The course will include meetings with some communicators of large Italian companies and will be divided into a workshop in which students will try out and practice the tools and experience of measuring and evaluating a brand's communication, carrying out a direct survey in the field, with the tools of quantitative and qualitative measurement.

At the end of the course, which will consist of 40 hours of theory and 20 hours of laboratory, there will be two written tests for those attending, one on the general theory part and one on the laboratory with the function of giving the overall evaluation of the student and his level of learning and commitment, in relation to both the course texts, lectures and laboratory activities.
The following will be assessed:
- the knowledge of the foundational elements of the discipline and the correct use of the terminology of the subject;
- the critical skills in employing the knowledge learned from the texts, during lectures and in the laboratory;
- the elements to deal effectively with practical-professional issues for a communicator;
- The ability to use communication evaluation and brand image analysis methodologies