A Charitable approach to business

The University of Bradford was the only academic institution invited to contribute to a Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO) conference on the relationship between charity and commercial brands, when the Management Centre's new Professor of Corporate Identity, John Balmer, teamed up with Professor Stephen Greyser, of Harvard Business School, to discuss ways of managing the charity-commercial relationship.

Professor Greyser, editorial-board chairman of the Harvard Business Review, is a leading authority on corporate-reputation management, consumer-buying behaviour, advertising and sports marketing. Professor Balmer was founder director of the International Centre for Corporate Identity Studies at the University of Strathclyde, before joining Bradford.

Among other contributors to the event were Adair Turner, director-general of the Confederation of British Industries, and Peter Mandelson, Northern Ireland Secretary. The event was chaired by VSO president Jonathan Dimbleby.

Professor Balmer commented:

There was considerable interest in the session, which was very well supported.

Professor Greyser and I were able to draw on our experience in, respectively, the USA and Britain. We pointed out that there are risks as well as rewards for charities which enter close relationships with commercial organisations, and urged charities to be realistic and ready to end a relationship if circumstances change.

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University - Public Relations - Annual Reports - 2000 Contents - Research

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