James Dyson is a well-respected designer and innovative thinker. However, his business is succeeding not only because of its world-class design focus, but because of Dyson’s own approach to governance and his ability to lead in an authentic and transparent manner. For him and other UK businesses, authenticity and transparency in governance are now the second-most important aspects of a corporate reputation.

According to the Reputation Institute’s RepTrak 150 ranking, which examines corporate reputation through seven influencers (products & services, governance, citizenship, innovation, leadership, workplace, performance),  governance has increased in importance by 1.5% since 2016.

This shift is in keeping with the broader social shift toward populism becoming apparent in many counties’ political systems.

For British business, though, this means that communications is ever more important in maintaining a positive corporate reputation. “There’s a clamour these days for openness and transparency in communications and it’s increasing,” says director of consulting services at the Reputation Institute, Ed Coke. He adds that uncertainty is rising, thus making it harder for companies to communicate in the way that consumers want them to.

That partially explains the RepTrak’s top 10 companies, which includes Waitrose, Dyson and Lego. Lego is one that won favour last summer for its decision to stop advertising in the Daily Mail as part of Stop Funding Hate’s push to put pressure on media companies using hate speech. Companies that approach communications with honesty and openness, despite having suffered crises in recent years – the likes of which include Samsung, Barclays and Lloyds Banking Group – have all shown improvement. In fact, Samsung’s swift and honest response to its recall of the Galaxy Note 7 phone has seen it take the nine spot in the top 10. Volkswagen, however, suffered from its close-fisted handling of the emissions scandal in 2015 and has yet to recover

Another top 10 performer is B2B brand Intel. It’s the only one on the list that makes a product the average consumer will never feel or see. Though Intel chips are in countless devices, they don’t sell directly to consumers. That the consumers surveyed by the Reputation Institute think highly of Intel is a testament to the company’s creation of a clear brand with a strong focus on innovation.

“2017 is this crossroads of uncertainty and trust,” Coke says. “I think the key is around perceptions of fairness and authenticity. Those companies that can take a leaf from the honest communications that they’ve seen elsewhere can really benefit.

Five minutes with Ed Coke

What surprises you about the UK top 10?

We’ve seen significant change at the top in the previous four or five years. From 2016, we’ve seen five new entrants – Dyson, Michelin, Waitrose, Paypal and Intel – inside the top 10 for the first time ever. There’s also a diversity of sectors to appreciate and welcome. There is no ceiling to reputation based on sector alone. Our contention would still be that people know excellence when they see it and it doesn’t matter what kind of category that company is operating in.

The very interesting thing for me is the respect a financially focused company like Paypal has within the UK general public. We don’t see that with other financial services and that’s a nod to the future. Paypal yields a reputation dividend because it has extended performance around great products and services, and not being a bank means it doesn’t have that baggage. It’s an example of what fintech can offer retail banks if they want to increase their reputation.

What impact has the increased importance of governance had on the banking sector?

Lloyds raised its reputation by nine points, which is a significant rise and is something we’ve seen in the other banks. Over time Barclays has risen, Nationwide – which was preforming particularly strongly – and even much-vilified companies like RBS have come up. The drip-feed focus that they’ve had on customer fairness appears to have yielded dividends. That’s particularly the case for Lloyds and Barclays.  It’s more than just marketing, it’s more than having great products and reliable services, it’s this concept of fairness in terms of authenticity that can really yield positive dividends.

How does a crisis affect corporate reputation?

I think that an authentic response to crisis softens the blow. We’ve seen this with Samsung in the UK. It went through a significant issue with the Galaxy Note 7 in 2016 so you’d expect its reputation to take a dive this year. But we haven’t seen that. It still has an excellent reputation among UK consumers and it’s still in the top 10.

Samsung handled the crisis very well in terms of serving customers and taking an authentic approach and essentially having to reel back from a major product launch and bear those consequences. It hasn’t damaged Samsung as much as some of the inauthentic responses to some of the crises we’ve seen in the past like that of Volkswagen or TalkTalk.

What should companies do to maintain a good reputation?

First off, it’s being true to their corporate selves by having a long hard look at potential risks and seeking to maintain well-established reputations. The second part is to take a leaf out of the political playbook and understand truly what the most important stakeholders actually want and expect.

What will happen to corporate reputation management in the near future?

My expectation is we’re going to see more preemptive honesty, provided it’s underpinned with those core competencies [detailed in second paragraph]. That’s where we’re going to see some good differentiation. To keep communicating from a corporate perspective, if we want to remain close to our stakeholders they need to be imbued with what a corporate stands for, and the style and manner in which you’re communicating it.