BA-project, May 2010
Tina Bech Svoldgaard and Marianne Johnsen Gøgsig
Table of contents
1. Introduction (Tina/Marianne)…………………………………………………………………………………………………2
1.1. Problem statement…………………………………………………………………………………………………..4
1.2. Method…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….5
1.3. Delimitation……………………………………………………………………………………………………………..6
1.4. Source criticism………………………………………………………………………………………………………..6
2. Theory…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….8
2.1. Definition of a crisis (Tina)…………………..……………………………………………………………………8
2.2. Crisis communication in general (Marianne)…….…………………………………………………….10
2.3. William Benoit’s Theory of Image Restoration Strategies (Tina/Marianne)……………..12
2.4. Criticism of William Benoit’s theory (Tina/Marianne)……………….…………………………….17
3. Analysis of Toyota Motor Corporation………………………………………………………………………………….18
3.1. Analysis of the Toyota incidents – crisis or not? (Marianne)...... 18
3.2. Analysis of Akio Toyoda’s speech to the U.S. Congress (Marianne)………………………….20
3.3. Analysis of the speech by Jim Lentz (Tina)……………………………………………………………….24
3.4. Analysis of Toyota press release (Tina)…………………………………………………………………….26
3.5. Conclusion of the analysis of Toyota (Tina /Marianne)…………………………………………….28
4. Analysis of Tiger Woods…………………………………………………………………………………………………………29
4.1. Analysis of the Tiger Woods incidents – crisis or not? (Tina)...... 29
4.2. Analysis of Tiger Woods’ apology speech (Tina)………………………………………………………31
4.3. Analysis of Tiger Woods’ press releases (Marianne)………………………………………………..35
4.4. Conclusion of the analysis of Tiger Woods (Tina/Marianne)…………………………………….38
5. Comparative analysis of Toyota and Tiger Woods (Tina/Marianne)………….………………………….39
6. Effective crisis communication or not? (Tina/Marianne)……………………………………………………….40
7. Conclusion (Tina/Marianne)…………………………………………………………………………………………………..43
8. Bibliography…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..46
Appendices 1- 6
1. Introduction
What is it that Toyota and Tiger Woods have in common? At first sight, there may not be much of a resemblance between the two, however; this is a question we intend to clarify throughout this following introduction, where we will be presenting both parties, beginning with Toyota:
Toyota Motor Corporation, also known as Toyota, is a multinational corporation with headquarters in Toyota City and in Tokyo, Japan. Toyota is one of the world’s largest automobile makers and employs approximately 320,000 people worldwide.[1] The company was founded August 28, 1937, by Kiichiro Toyoda, who dedicated his life to the manufacturing of cars. In 1935, after years of hard work, he finally succeeded in creating the A1 prototype passenger car, an achievement which marked the beginning of the company.[2]
Since their foundation, Toyota has continuously worked to contribute to the sustainable development of society through innovative and high-quality products. Thus, one of the guiding principles of Toyota is to “create and develop advanced technologies and provide outstanding products and services that fulfill the needs of customers worldwide.”[3] Furthermore, according to the company’s website, Toyota seeks to “dedicate ourselves to providing clean and safe products and to enhancing the quality of life everywhere through all our activities.”[4]
However; since last summer, 2009, Toyota has experienced some very unfortunate incidents concerning some of their vehicles. The problem surfaced after the first accident that took place in Santee, California. The accident was caused by a pedal entrapment which made the vehicle in question accelerate to an incredibly high speed. Ultimately, the persons in the car were all killed.[5] This was only the beginning of a long row of similar more or less serious incidents, all apparently caused by a “sticking” effect on the pedal in a large number of Toyota’s vehicles. After various investigations of the problem causing these very unfortunate events, Toyota, in October 2009, decided to recall several of their vehicles in the United States. In January 2010, the number of recalls reached more than 5 million different types of Toyota cars.[6] These series of events have received massive media attention since the very beginning and have turned out to be the largest recall in the history of Toyota. It has become a huge issue for the Toyota Motor Corporation, concerning both the image and the results of the company.[7]
As for the second party in our assignment, we have chosen to work with Tiger Woods. He is an American professional golf player, born in Cypress, California, in 1975. In 1996, Tiger Woods became a professional and since then, his success has gone remarkably upwards. Today, Woods ranks as the World’s number one golf player with several victories in several of the largest golf tournaments in the bag. Thus, in 2008, Woods was no less than the highest paid athlete in the world, due to his winnings and endorsements.[8] Among the various number of Tiger Woods’ sponsors we can mention EA Sports, Gillette and Nike.[9]
Besides his career as a professional golf player, Tiger Woods also engages in charity work. In 1996, Woods and his father established The Tiger Woods Foundation, whose focus lies on projects for children, such as golf clinics, grant programs and university scholarships. Furthermore, Tiger Woods engages in the Tiger Woods Learning Center, which is an educational facility in Anaheim, California, and the main purpose of the center is to teach golf to children.[10]
However; within the past months, Tiger Woods has not been the target of media attention because of his golf talent. In November 2009 it was revealed to the public that Tiger Woods had had several affairs with different women on the side of his marriage to the Swedish model Elin Nordegren. The situation took another down-turn for Woods a few days after these revelations, when he was involved in a single car accident in his own SUV right outside his home in Orlando, Florida.[11] From here on, an avalanche of events set off and Woods was repeatedly connected with several women with whom he apparently had been involved with. This caused a major reaction among the public, including Tiger Woods’ sponsors. Where the professional golf player used to be seen as a highly reliable brand in sports, his image had now been damaged among the public, due to his behavior – something that resulted in an actual fall in prices for some of Woods’ sponsors.[12] According to an article found on the online-edition of Time Magazine, the circumstances has placed Tiger Woods’ sponsors in a rather difficult position, facing the choice of whether to continue cooperating with Woods or not.[13]
Thus, in order to answer the question in the very beginning of this introduction, it can be argued that both Toyota and Tiger Woods have been exposed to a great amount of negative media attention due to the respective unfortunate incidents mentioned above. What they have had in common the past months has been the growing mistrust of the public and the threat to their image, based on these exact incidents. Opinion polls have shown that the popularity, and thus the trust, of both Toyota and Tiger Woods fell significantly after the revelation of the respective events.[14] These drops in the ratings have had serious consequences for both parties.
1.1. Problem statement
Therefore, this assignment will deal with the crisis communication of both Toyota and Tiger Woods concerning these recent happenings. Thus, our problem statement is as follows:
We will analyze whether both Toyota Motor Corporation and Tiger Woods are experiencing a crisis or not according the theory of Ulmer, Sellnow and Seeger. Furthermore, we will analyze how both parties have dealt with their respective image restoration according to William Benoit’s Theory of Image Restoration Strategies. We will investigate which strategies they have employed in their verbal and written defense and what this tells us. As a sub-question, we will make a brief comparative analysis of how Toyota, as a company, has dealt with their recent events and how Tiger Woods, as an individual, has dealt with his recent events. This will be done in order to see if there is any resemblance between a company and an individual when making use of William Benoit’s theory. Finally, we will make a brief comment on whether their respective crisis communication may have had an effect, based on statistics.
1.2. Method
Firstly, we will provide an analysis of the current situation of both Toyota and Tiger Woods, which means an analysis of whether they are in fact experiencing a crisis or not, according to the theory of Ulmer, Sellnow and Seeger. Furthermore, our analysis of the image restoration of both Toyota and Tiger Woods will be based on speeches and press releases from each party. The analysis will solely be based on William Benoit’s model: The Theory of Image Restoration Strategies. After having analyzed our material, we intend to make a brief comparative analysis of the two parties, in order to discuss if they have made use of the same strategies, again according to Benoit. The strategies employed in this assignment will be further described in our section of theory, section 2.3.
Our list of sources contains books as well as various articles, web-articles and web-pages and we will base our analysis on a few selected press releases and speeches from each party. Regarding the speeches, we have them transcribed ourselves. Furthermore, we have chosen to include some statistics in our assignment, in order to discuss whether the parties’ respective crisis communication may have had an effect.
For the sake of clarity we will mention, that we, throughout our complete assignment, will refer to Toyota as both Toyota, Toyota Motor Corporation and as the company. Furthermore, regarding Akio Toyoda, he will be referred to as both Akio Toyoda and Mr. Toyoda. As for Tiger Woods, he will be referred to as both Tiger Woods and Woods. We have chosen to do so in order not to make too many repetitions and thus obtain a more fluent language in our assignment. Finally, when comparing Toyota and Tiger Woods, they will at times be referred to as the parties/each party.
1.3. Delimitation
For the sake of clarity we have chosen to make use of only one theorist, namely William Benoit, and his Theory of Image Restoration Strategies, since this model can be applied to both companies as well as individuals. We realize that there are a large number of theories on crisis communication and image restoration, however; we have chosen to use Benoit’s model since he has been a large contributor to the studies of crisis communication.
Despite the fact that our analysis comprises two parties from different countries and cultures, we will not be dealing with cultural differences whatsoever. Furthermore, since the area of crisis communication is rather extensive, we will only concentrate on the parties’ behavior after having experienced an eventual crisis and this according to William Benoit’s model, as mentioned before. Thus, we will not go into aspects such as issue management etc. – we will only deal with the aspect of image restoration. Our analysis will solely be based on a few selected press releases and speeches, published by each party.
Furthermore, as for Toyota, our assignment will only deal with the company’s recalls in the United States. Therefore, the press release we will analyze also solely comprises information about the situation in the U.S.
1.4. Source Criticism
In order to write this assignment, we have made use of several different sources to support our theory and analysis. We are aware of the importance to remain critical towards any source used and therefore we will briefly explain why we have chosen our exact sources.
According to the book written by William Benoit, Accounts, Excuses and Apologies, we must assume that this exact source is rather trustworthy, since it is William Benoit’s theory we are using. It can be argued whether Benoit himself is critical towards his own theories, however; we have included a criticism of his models in the theoretical section of this assignment. Therefore, we are aware of the advantages and disadvantages of Benoit’s theories, but it can only be assumed that Benoit’s own book is the best source to use when seeking an explanation of his theories.
Regarding the two other books used, we have chosen these sources due to the fact that both W. Timothy Coombs as well as Ulmer, Sellnow and Seeger are respected theorists within the field of crisis communication. Therefore, it must be assumed that both books are to trust regarding useful information. We see no reason for questioning the content of these materials.
As for the articles written by Finn Frandsen and Winni Johansen, these two are also known theorists within the field of crisis communication. When searching the internet for articles written by these two authors, several hits appears on well-known web-sites such as the Danish Kommunikationsforum.dk as well as links to the Aarhus School of Business, where both individuals are in fact employed as lecturers. Therefore, we see no reason to doubt the credibility of the materials written by Finn Frandsen and Winni Johansen.
Regarding the speeches and press releases used for our analysis, these have been found on both the respective web-pages of Toyota and Tiger Woods and on Youtube, in order to see and listen to the exact verbal defense. It must be assumed, that when our press releases are accessible on the web-sites of the two parties, they are somewhat reliable since they are not affected by any other factor. They comprise first-hand information from each of our analyze objects. As for the speeches, which we have located on Youtube, these must also be assumed to be trustworthy, since they all in fact show Jim Lentz, Akio Toyoda and Tiger Woods respectively giving their speech to the public. Furthermore, since we have transcribed the speeches ourselves, no other factor has been able to manipulate with the content of the speech. Nevertheless, regarding the transcripts, it is important to mention that we experienced some minor difficulties when writing down what was said by Akio Toyoda, Jim Lentz and Tiger Woods. It was not always possible to hear the exact words, which is why we have chosen to post the links to the different speeches on each of their appendices. However; we have only chosen to analyze the quotations of which we are sure to have understood what was uttered, in order not to analyze erroneously.
As for the web-pages Fox News, Gallup, Time Magazine and Reuters, we will categorize these sources as being somewhat reliable, since all of them are well-known and respected communicators. Therefore, we see no reason for questioning the information received from these pages.
Finally, regarding the rest of our web-page sources, such as Wikipedia and Google, it can be argued if these sources are sufficiently credible. However; the particular web-articles have solely been used for the sake of background knowledge, and thus they do not have a crucial significance in our analysis. Therefore we have chosen to include these sources in our assignment, while remaining critical towards them throughout the entire process.