What are the drivers affecting your reputation? One thing’s for sure: they’re complex. Perhaps your strategy is on a pressure group’s hit list. Your overseas subsidiaries sail too close to the regulatory wind. Your CEO wears too many hats. Or a vital part of your supply chain sources unsustainably.

It can all be understood by mapping the messages out there. How they hit your reputational drivers in detail, down to different audience segments. (What’s great for an investor may sound less great to an employee.) Seeing those topics in context with the people they’re influencing lets you make decisions and place policies effectively.

With that built, you can compare it with your governance strategy and compliance policies, and see where to concentrate your energies. Because whatever the internal view is, you know your external market is your sternest judge. And there’s nothing wrong with that.