Revealing the Pattern
How Religious Organizations Respond to Image Threatening Events
A Brief Summary based on Dr. Wade Mullen’s PhD Dissertation
After an image threatening event, organizations and their leaders must give an account to their stakeholders and community.
At that time they are faced with two choices:
“Option 1: Adopt truth-telling and transparency, irrespective of the impact on one’s approval, status, or image.
Option 2: Adopt impression management strategies created to improve the organization’s image in the eyes of its stakeholders.”
Choosing Option 1 means the organization admits guilt, owns responsibility, offers appropriate penalizing actions, and compensates the offended, injured, or harmed. They take responsibility and offer restitution.
Research shows evangelical organizations—especially—may believe truth-telling or admission of fault to be fatal to the existence of their community. This fear can create a strong motivation to maintain a positive impression. Therefore, these types of organizations often choose Option 2 which includes adopting a variety of strategies to boost approval, status, or a positive image in order to maintain control of the situation and their audience. In lieu of addressing the problem and righting the wrong, they may choose to manage the threat to the image of the organization instead. The objective now becomes controlling and redefining information accessible to the audience: staff, stakeholders, and the public.
Research has also found that during an image crisis followers naturally will defer more to the opinions, ideas, and actions of their leaders who are seen as knowledgeable and authoritative. They actually become more subordinate to their leaders than they otherwise would be. Leaders will capitalize on this natural instinct to centralize decision-making power and at the same time convey overly optimistic messages that attempt to legitimize this centralization of power. They will then engage in a variety of assertive and defensive image management strategies to control their audience’s perception of them.
Image Management = Harm
If you or someone you know is involved in an organization that has chosen Option 2 during an image threatening event, it’s important that you not remain silent and go along with the status quo.
Such behavior harms the organization and its constituents in 2 ways:
1. Leadership is not held accountable to follow a lifestyle modeled by Jesus, which will bring harm (or further harm) to followers and stakeholders as well as dishonor to Christ and his Church.
2. Whistle-blowers who have brought an issue to light will continue to suffer abuse not only from the organization’s leadership but it’s followers who tend to mirror a leader’s abuse during an image-threatening event.
Image Management Tactics
Familiarize yourself with these 20 Image Management Tactics commonly used by organizations in crisis so that you can educate yourself and others:
Direct Assertive Tactics
Ingratiation / Charm (Flattery, Gifts, Helps, Opinion Conformity)
Intimidation
Organizational Promotion
Exemplification
Supplication
1. INGRATIATION
Ingratiation or Charm is the #1 most frequently used tactic by abusers in spiritual communities. It’s goal is to create trust and increase your approval of the person or organization so you’ll be more likely to comply with their demands. Charm is employed to build favor and trust in order to convince people to do what they want.
Ingratiation Tactic 1—Flattery: Flattery asks you to look at exaggerated positive characteristics while keeping you from seeing the true desires of the person or organization. You will be told how exemplary you are (better than others in some way) and how God has anointed you. The difference between flattery and sincere encouragement is the flatterer expects flattery to be returned. When the wheel of praise spins faster and faster, anything other than praise becomes shunned in the group. People become hesitant to speak criticism which comes to be seen as negative, disruptive, or disrespectful.
Ingratiation Tactic 2—Gifts: Gifts are given to enhance your life in exemplary or unexpected ways.
Ingratiation Tactic 3—Helps: Helps are offered in ways that are not necessary. The victim is convinced that this person or organization alone can help them achieve their goals.
Ingratiation Tactic 4—Opinion Conformity: Shared opinions or views are highlighted to create a false sense of alliance.
2. INTIMIDATION
Intimidation tactics can be spotted as attempts to belittle, discredit, or defame whistle-blowers and those criticizing the organization. Experienced abusers will often use Ingratiation Tactics (Charm, Flattery, Gifts, Helps, and Opinion Conformity) in tandem with Intimidation Tactics, communicating that non-compliance could result in harm rather than charm. Fear is wrapped in packages marked “love”.
3. ORGANIZATIONAL PROMOTION
Behaviors that present the organization as being highly competent, effective, and successful.
4. EXEMPLIFICATION
Utilized by an organization or individual to project images of integrity, social responsibility, and moral worthiness.
5. SUPPLICATION
Employed by the organization to portray an image of dependency and vulnerability for the purpose of acquiring help, favor, or sympathy from others.
Direct Defensive Tactics
Accounts (Excuses and Justifications)
Disclaimers
Organizational Handicapping
Prosocial Behavior
1. ACCOUNTS
Accounts are explanations of a negative event that seek to minimize the apparent severity of the event.
The leadership of an organization may downplay the mistakes it made in resolving a crisis by suggesting that no person was harmed by the events.
There are 2 types of accounts: Excuses and Justifications. These are defensive statements intended to explain away the negative event in order to escape responsibility or disapproval. Excuses argue that the organization is not responsible for decisions and behaviors. Justifications admit responsibility but deny the event or consequences were negative.
Excuse (Type 1)—Denial of Intention: Statements are made that suggest that certain negative events were unforeseeable and, thus, outside of the organization’s control.
Excuse (Type 2)—Denial of Volition: Organizations communicate they could not control nor be expected to control the negative event. The implication is that the organization is experiencing the negative event irrespective of organizational practices or decisions. The intended result is that the audience will perceive the event as a phenomenon that no organization would reasonably be expected to take responsibility for.
Excuse (Type 3)—Denial of Agency: Organizations may argue that they themselves did not make a particular decision or perform a specific behavior that caused a negative event. The goal is to lead the stakeholders to believe that they did not produce or cause the negative event in question.
Justification (Type 1)—Denial of Injury: A claim is made that no harm has occurred as a result of decisions, behaviors, or events.
Justification (Type 2)—Denial of Victim: The organization argues that no innocent individuals have been negatively affected by decisions or events. If individuals have been harmed by the negative event, the organization may suggest that such harm was deserving or self-inflicted. The decisions and behaviors made by the organization were appropriate since no individual was negatively affected who did not deserve such consequences.
Justification (Type 3)—Denial of Credibility: The organization justifies their behavior by condemning the condemner. The organization acknowledges that a negative event has occurred with negative consequences but suggests that those who are condemning the organization’s behavior are not credible, have some ulterior motive, or have caused the negative event. Therefore, the statements made by the condemner should not be given any weight.
Justification (Type 4)—Negative Events “Misrepresented”: Organizations may claim that the negative event in question is simply being misrepresented, misconstrued, or taken out of context.
2. DISCLAIMERS
Explanations are given in anticipation of a negative event in order to ward off any potential future threats to the organization’s image. This strategy is anticipatory or preemptive, its main purpose being to justify a future action, decision, or event that will likely be viewed as negative.
3. ORGANIZATIONAL HANDICAPPING
Efforts are made by the organization to make success appear unlikely in order to provide a ready-made excuse for failure. By suggesting that the organization is handicapped in some way, the organization can then use that perception as an excuse for its failure. An organization may, for example, blame a lack of training, resources, or staffing for a mishandling of a crisis.
4. PROSOCIAL BEHAVIOR
An organization diverts attention by highlighting the organization’s involvement in prosocial actions. These attempts are designed to protect the image of the organization by diluting (rather than refuting) negative claims about the organization.
Indirect Assertive Tactics
In addition to these direct assertive and defensive tactics, indirect assertive tactics are also often employed. These include boasting, blaring, burnishing, blasting, and burying, which are attempts to do the following in order to enhance image:
Create a positive link to a favorable person or organization.
Exaggerate a negative feature of or link to an unfavorable person or organization.
Obscure, deny, or conceal the organization’s connection to an unfavorable other.
Additional Resources
The following resource can deepen your understanding of the image management tactics described above through the lens of both biblical and contemporary examples:
View an excerpt from Dr. Mullen’s Dissertation which examines image management tactics through a theological lens based on biblical case studies.
