Character assassination of CEOs in crises – Questioning CEOs’ character and values in corporate crises

Abstract

This study explores the concept of character assassination in the field of corporate communication. We examine the perception of character traits and personal values of chief executive officers in Austria and Germany during corporate crises. Results suggest that character attacks mostly focus on a chief executive officer’s integrity, while a positive public perception of charisma seems to be related to a chief executive officer’s remaining in office. Furthermore, personal values were under more intense public scrutiny when the chief executive officer in question had to leave their office. Thus, the study suggests that character traits and values are antecedents which influence the outcomes of the process of character assassination.

Keywords

Character assassination chief executive officer crisis communication content analysis personality traits values

Introduction

Just like party leaders in politics, company leaders – above all the chief executive officer (CEO) – are the figureheads to whom corporate stakeholders attribute the power and responsibility for corporate policy making. In times of crisis, when a critical and intense issue threatens the existence of an organization in terms of its basic assumptions, values and ways of operating (Weick, 1988), the CEO of a company is particularly foregrounded. Stakeholders, including those directly affected as well as the general public, search for the person or persons to whom to attribute responsibility for the situation (Coombs, 2007; Weiner, 1985). The news media play an important role in this process of attribution and judgement formation by covering and interpreting the crisis and thereby shaping public opinion about the company and its leaders.

A crisis situation puts the CEO not only in the public court of criticism but also at the centre of internal power struggles regarding who prevails or who may need to put his neck on the line. The fight for power is a prime time for character assassination (CA) (attempts), which is the ‘deliberate and sustained effort to damage the reputation or credibility of an individual’ (Samoilenko, 2016: 115). In the course of the internal power struggle, the CEO may become an excellent target for blame games and scapegoating which may lead to his or her victimization and possibly ‘assassination’.

In crises, stakeholder perceptions of the company and its CEO’s character and value-system as well as the struggle for supremacy inside the firm are thus key aspects to consider. While CEO visibility plays an important role in corporate communication (Turk et al., 2012) and is to be closely considered in crisis communication (Lucero et al., 2009), personalization of the CEO may come at a price. In the political context, the consequence of personalization seems to be a change of expectations in citizens with regard to the personal character of political leaders (Garzia, 2011). Accordingly, we can expect the character traits and values of business leaders to be under close scrutiny by stakeholders, especially in times of crises. As crises and power struggles comprise various news factors like conflict, controversy and personification (Shoemaker and Cohen, 2006), this is likely to be amplified in news media coverage. Depending on who the media put in the spotlight and how they portray the CEO’s character and value system, they may fortify the attacks on the person and possibly promote the process of CA.

Thus far, CA has been researched mainly in the field of political marketing and political psychology. Yet, since politics as a struggle for power also applies to the politics of corporations, this concept is very well applicable to a business context, especially to corporate crises. In this research, we connect the concept of CA (Icks and Shiraev, 2014; Samoilenko et al., 2018) to CEOs of business organizations during crises, thereby expanding the research on CA to a corporate context and corporate communication. The phenomenon of character attacks and possibly assassination is evaluated by analysing the news media coverage on CEOs of 13 German and Austrian companies who underwent a corporate crisis between 2010 and 2016. The following research questions are at the centre of this study:

RQ1. How do the news media portray the characters and values of CEOs of companies that undergo a crisis?

RQ2. Is there a relation between the media’s attribution of specific character traits and values to CEOs and their perseverance in power during and after a crisis?

Literature review

CA in politics and business

Politics is a basic feature of every human society. Wherever there is power, there is also politics, since power is the quintessence of politics (Luhmann, 2002). Power then is ultimately about influence, represented by concepts such as authority, reputation or leadership (Luhmann, 2003). Questions of power and influence arise in every organization, not only political ones, since every organization has to embody decision-making processes. And in order to make decisions or influence decisions, power is necessary.

CA is one way to either contest the political status quo by attacking those who embody power in the organization, or to defend the status quo by attacking those who contest it. CA as an effort to damage the reputation or credibility of an individual (Samoilenko et al., 2018), is therefore as much of concern for companies as it is for political parties. Just as character attacks can aim at manipulating voters during an election to support or drop support for a certain candidate – the 2016 US presidential election campaign has provided numerous examples – they may challenge the integrity or competence of a corporate CEO and force him or her to resign from corporate leadership. At its core, CA is the attempt to disrupt the fabric of the organization by attempting to alienate the leadership (or parts of it) from its members/supporters. It is no coincidence that disruptive attempts of CA target reputation and integrity, since these are determinants of social status and indicators for affiliation. Due to their built-in, fundamental motives (Griskevicius and Kenrick, 2013; Kenrick et al., 2010), humans strive for affiliation and status to form alliances, maintain them and to amass prestige and respect among fellow individuals. CA disrupts processes that lead to these outcomes, such as reciprocal altruism (Trivers, 1971), indirect reciprocity (Nowak and Sigmund, 1998) and social contracting (Cosmides, 1989). Thus, the ultimate aim of CA is to isolate an individual from its social network, by destroying his or her reputation and integrity.

Despite its applicability to all organizational contexts (Samoilenko et al., 2018), CA has hardly been researched in the business sphere. Core texts like Davis’ Character Assassination (1950), Icks’ and Shiraev’s recent work on Character Assassination throughout the Ages (2014), as well as first empirical studies such as the analysis of the media coverage around the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 by Samoilenko et al. (2015), all centre around CA within the context of politics and political communication. However, Samoilenko et al. (2018) point out that there are many linkages between the concept of CA and the field of corporate communication, since CA is closely related to reputation management, image repair and public opinion.

For the field of public relations and corporate communication, it was Edward Bernays (1976) who introduced the term when he argued for an ombudsman for public relations in order to fend off unjustified CA of public relations professionals. Bernays warned of the dangers of blackened reputations by CA through false accusations. According to Samoilenko et al. (2018), especially in crisis situations organizations and their leaders are faced with challenges to their responsibility and legitimacy. In acccordance with Bernays, they argue that reputation is the core dimension that is challenged in the court of public opinion, with special foci on principles, ethics, values and beliefs in general. Thus, values and personal character traits of organizational leaders – in this case: CEOs – are an important focal point when addressing CA in the context of corporate communication.

Character traits and values of business leaders

According to Schwartz (2012), the same term can describe a trait and a value. However, while a trait shows what a person is like, a value is something a person deems important. Values guide an individual’s actions, since they refer to goals, which in turn motivate action (Schwartz, 1992). Thus, values provide criteria with which the evaluation of action is possible. Values, in that regard, are equally important as traits when assessing CA in a corporate setting. They also work towards the individual-social unit fit, since they constitute culture (Geertz, 1973) and also organizational culture (O’Reilly et al., 1991).

If stakeholders perceive the values of an organization to be consistent with their own values, it is likely that they will identify themselves stronger with the organization (Elbedweihy et al., 2016; Lee et al., 2012). Also, a leader who acts in consistence with his or her values gains integrity and thus trustworthiness (Bauman, 2013), relational qualities ‘that engages the moral sensibilities that are present in all human communities’ (Nicholson, 2015: 1173; see also Brown and Treviño, 2006). Leaders increase the salience of values in an organization – most effectively when they are ‘consistent in terms of identity level and the values they stress’ (Lord and Brown, 2001: 137). Thus, a perceived congruence of values between leaders and followers/supporters – and eventually stakeholders – will likely result in a higher satisfaction and willingness to support (Ehrhart and Klein, 2001). Accordingly, Sosik (2005) was able to show that consistency in behaviour and embraced values of corporate managers supported employer empowerment. In addition, consistency in moral and its application increase confidence and assurance in followers (Moorman et al., 2013). Research also shows that values of CEOs have a moderating influence on organizational efficiency (Aktaş et al., 2011) and that they impact company recruitment (Ogunfowora, 2014).

Numerous works have furthermore shown the importance of character traits for the concept of leadership (e.g. Cismas et al., 2016; King et al., 2009; Uhl-Bien et al., 2014). Thus, a CEOs appearance in charisma or other characteristics is likely to positively influence stock prices (Tosi et al., 2004), corporate performance (Pollach and Kerbler, 2011; Rajagopalan and Datfa, 1996), and corporate reputation (Cravens et al., 2003). Furthermore, a perceived congruence of characteristics represented in the leading person also strengthens internal identification (Huettermann et al., 2014) with the social entity – the corporation. Identification between those who lead and those who follow is considered the social glue that keeps groups together (Van Vugt and Hart, 2004). By attacking the character of a leading figure, CA tries to disintegrate the very social glue that glues the members of an organization together.

Character attacks on the CEO in corporate crises

A crisis provides an almost ideal setting for character attacks as it constitutes a situation when a critical and intense issue threatens the existence of an organization in terms of its basic assumptions, values, and ways of operating (Weick, 1988). The crisis itself leads to the questioning of the responsibility of those atop the organization. It is thus in times of crises that challenges to leadership arise.

The CEO is the most senior manager of a company, meaning that he or she is on top of the executive branch of an organization – sometimes more, sometimes less powerful, depending on the constitution of the organization. However, he or she is atop the organizational hierarchy, meaning that organizational legitimacy is to some extent embodied in the CEO (Men, 2015; Pincus et al., 1991). Even though the reality of organizations is much more complex, it is widely accepted that CEOs serve an important function with regard to organizational image and public representation of the organization (Park and Berger, 2004). Consequently, in the struggle for power in times of crises, the CEO is at the centre of events, hence the common saying, the rot starts at the top. This seems to be especially the case when the perceived crisis responsibility on the side of the organization is high, for example in an intentional crisis (Coombs, 2010). Thus, the emergence of a rift between the internal and external supporters of an organization and the person(s) in charge becomes likely.

Crises reveal differences in opinion about possible trajectories of organizational development. Opponents of the current trajectory might therefore use a crisis situation to employ character attacks in order to change the organizational trajectory by replacing the person at the helm. This is the moment when character traits and value concepts of CEOs come into play. According to Max Weber (2005), there are three distinct types of legitimate leadership: legal, traditional, and charismatic rule (pp. 157–181) – all of which are inseparably connected to values and character traits in one way or another. In order to replace a CEO, character attacks target the CEO’s value system, his or her integrity and therefore his or her personal suitability for the job. By attacking the consistency of perceived values and traits, CA tries to dissolve the social glue that connects organizational members and stakeholders with the CEO. With these ties weakening in the onslaught, the CEO is in danger of loosing the necessary support for him or her to maintain his or her position in the company.

Dramatic events like crises attract the attention of the media as they contain news value, especially in the form of the deviance factors conflict, controversy, and personification (Shoemaker and Cohen, 2006). Thus, crises are an excellent source for news material. In their media analysis of the Ukrainian crisis, Samoilenko et al. (2015) found that both Russian and US media employed CA techniques in their news coverage. We can assume that CA is also likely to happen in corporate crisis situations. As the most powerful representative, the CEO is particularly in the spotlight and his or her character and values are likely to be attacked in journalistic coverage.

Empirical study: Sample and procedure

In order to answer the research questions, a media content analysis of the coverage of corporate crises in four German and four Austrian daily newspapers between 1 January 2010 and 1 March 2016 was conducted. The German media sample is composed of Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Süddeutsche Zeitung, Handelsblatt and Bild, the Austrian sample comprises Der Standard, Die Presse, Wirtschaftsblatt and Kronenzeitung. Both samples were chosen to provide an adequate blend of each countries’ mainstream broadsheet journalism, a business centred view, and the tabloid segment. In Germany, the two biggest daily broadsheets that are nationally distributed are the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, which is a liberal, right leaning medium, and the liberal, left leaning Süddeutsche Zeitung. Since the study focused on CEOs, the Handelsblatt, Germany’s biggest business newspaper, was chosen to include business journalism. Finally, Bild is Germany’s biggest daily tabloid newspaper with the highest circulation of all newspapers. To match that sample, newspapers in Austria were chosen accordingly: Die Presse is liberal, right leaning, Der Standard is liberal, left leaning, the Wirtschaftsblatt is predominantly a business newspaper and the Kronenzeitung is Austria’s number one tabloid newspaper. Thus, both samples represent an appropriate and comparable segment of the two countries’ mainstream news discourse.

In a first step, we searched for relevant crisis situations of the 100 largest companies in Germany (according to Forbes Global 2000) and in Austria (according to trend-Top-500-Ranking) respectively that took place during the research period. To identify the corporate crises, we conducted an in-depth search within the APA-Defacto online manager library (APA-Defacto GmbH, 2016) by applying the respective company name plus the search terms ‘crisis’, ‘scandal’, ‘affair’ and/or ‘bankruptcy’. After identifying the crises, we collected all articles on the crisis that appeared in the printed issues of the selected media.

We included all articles that contained (a) the respective company as the main subject, (b) one or more of the search terms, and that mentioned (c) a current and/or former CEO who is or was in office during the research period. After the collection of articles, we excluded all crises that generated 10 or fewer articles per CEO, in order to limit bottom outliers. This selection process yielded four Austrian companies that were portrayed by the press to be in a state of crisis, including nine CEOs, and nine German companies with 19 CEOs who were in office while their respective companies were regarded to be in crisis situations. The analysis was not centred on articles about specific crises, but on companies that were portrayed to be in a crisis situation by journalists. It was therefore possible that the articles analysed contained more than one crisis per company.¹ Media content analysis on German corporate crises and CEOs was limited to the four German newspapers, and media analysis of the Austrian crises and CEOs was limited to the Austrian media sample.

A comprehensive codebook was developed to code the different manifest and latent variables (see Appendix 1). Coding was done on two levels: (1) on the article level, we coded those variables that referred to the article as a whole as unit of analysis, like medium, date, and CEO referred to most prominently in the whole article. (2) On the content level, individual statements within each article were first identified and then coded. A statement was considered present when a CEO was attributed a personality trait or value (explicit appraisal) or when a topic was described that implied an assessment (implicit appraisal). Each statement was coded regarding the CEO referred to most prominently in the statement, and the personality and value aspects attributed to the CEO. Personality was operationalized following the research by Park and Berger (2004) who in turn drew on Miller et al. (1986). In their study on character traits of CEOs in US media, Park and Berger distinguished five dimensions of the publicly perceived CEO image: competence, charisma, integrity, reliability, and personal. For the analysis of attributed values, we adopted various scales based on Schwartz’ theory of basic human values (Boer, 2014; Schmidt et al., 2007; Schwartz et al., 2012). Since in these studies the values concept was operationalized for questionnaire-based surveys, we adapted the measures to suit categories in a media content analysis. Each personality and value aspect was then coded on three appraisal levels (tone): positive, neutral/ambivalent or negative.

For each of the CEOs, we included the central variable retention. Negative retention was coded when the CEO was dismissed from office or resigned voluntarily as a result of the crisis; it was coded as positive when he or she still remains or remained in office during the crisis. Retention was also considered positive when the CEO left but not due to the crisis but because of natural reasons like age or expiration of contract. Appendix 2 gives an overview of the CEOs, their status and whether they continued in office or not.

Twenty-one coders received extensive training to code the variables on the article and content level. After two rounds of pre-testing, intercoder reliability was assessed using a subsample of 80 articles, reaching satisfactory results (Holsti coefficient = 90.1; see Holsti, 1969). Data analysis was conducted using IBM SPSS Statistics 22.

Results

The 28 CEOs in our sample who were leaders during the selected corporate crises, were covered in N = 881 articles (German = 806, Austrian = 75). Within each of the articles up to 32 content level statements were identified and coded; this amounted to a total of N = 2376 content level units of analysis (German = 2262, Austrian = 114). The corporate crises that received the most news coverage (articles) were VW (n = 192), Deutsche Bank (n = 183) and Siemens (n = 107). In the Austrian sample, the oil and gas company OMV received most media attention (n = 35). The topics that were covered most frequently in the articles were corporate performance, corporate strategy, HR decisions/CEO change and legal affairs (see Table 1).

Table 1.

Topics covered most frequently in articles (by company).

% (n)	Corporate performance	Corporate strategy	HR decisions/CEO change	Legal affairs
Deutsche Bank	26 (48)	4 (8)	9 (17)	14 (25)
VW	26 (50)	12 (23)	15 (28)	9 (17)
Siemens	48 (51)	6 (6)	18 (19)	3 (3)
Daimler	36 (28)	24 (19)	5 (4)	0 (0)
Eon	37 (26)	21 (15)	0 (0)	0 (0)
RWE	39 (23)	9 (5)	12 (7)	0 (0)
Deutsche Bahn	58 (23)	8 (3)	8 (3)	12 (5)
Lufthansa	37 (17)	17 (8)	13 (6)	0 (0)
Karstadt	42 (13)	26 (8)	13 (4)	0 (0)
OMV	20 (7)	20 (7)	9 (3)	14 (5)
Zielpunkt	63 (10)	31 (5)	0 (0)	0 (0)
Strabag	30 (3)	40 (4)	10 (1)	0 (0)
Bank Austria	29 (4)	14 (2)	0 (0)	0 (0)
Total	34 (303)	13(113)	11 (92)	6 (55)

N_{main topics} = 563 of N_total = 881.

Accordingly, the CEOs involved in the more frequently covered crises generally received most media attention. On the content level, most statements referred to the former CEO of VW, Martin Winterkorn (n = 241), who resigned in September 2015 after the emissions scandal broke, and to his successor Matthias Müller (n = 165). Of the four CEOs of Deutsche Bank, the leadership duo Jürgen Fitschen (n = 172) and Anshu Jain (n = 310), who were dismissed from their positions as CEOs, and the prior CEO Josef Ackermann (n = 238), as well as the new CEO John Cryan (n = 91) were intensely covered by the media. A lot of media attention was also given to Dieter Zetsche (n = 185), the CEO of Daimler, and to the former Siemens CEO Peter Löscher (n = 159), who was forced to resign because of bad performance, as well as to his successor Joe Kaeser (n = 106). Georg Pfeiffer (n = 47), owner of the family business Pfeiffer Group that owned the retailer Zielpunkt, was covered most intensely by Austrian media when Zielpunkt declared bankruptcy in 2015.

To gain insights regarding the research questions, we analysed how the CEOs were portrayed with respect to their character traits and values on the content level. To answer RQ1, how the news media portray the character and values of CEOs of companies that undergo a crisis, we analysed how often the different character and value aspects were attributed to the CEOs (see Table 2). Following Schwartz’ classification of values, we classified the 10 value types into four broader dimensions (for classification, see Appendix 1).

Table 2.

Frequency of character and value aspects attributed to CEOs in statements (by tone).

% (n)	Total	Positive	Neutral/ambivalent	Negative
CEO character
Competence	35 (622)	51 (316)	17 (106)	32 (200)
Integrity	19 (348)	36 (125)	28 (97)	36 (126)
Charisma	23 (405)	42 (168)	32 (129)	26 (108)
Personal	13 (236)	20 (46)	64 (153)	16 (37)
Reliability	10 (187)	39 (73)	29 (55)	32 (59)
CEO values
Self-enhancement	58 (597)	48 (284)	27 (165)	25 (148)
Self-transcendence	15 (153)	61 (94)	22 (33)	17 (26)
Openness to change	15 (149)	45 (67)	44 (65)	11 (17)
Conservation	12 (128)	39 (50)	36 (46)	25 (32)

N_character = 1798, N_values = 1027; the remaining cases were not assignable to one of the character/ value aspects.

The results show that the media predominantly attributed aspects of competence and self-enhancement (achievement, power) to CEOs during the selected crisis situations. Regarding tone, the appraisals are mainly positive and neutral, or ambivalent. Character attacks, that is, when the CEO character is portrayed in a negative tone, mainly occur with respect to a CEOs’ integrity. Value attacks, accordingly, mainly apply to the dimensions self-enhancement and conservation. However, CEOs were not under equal scrutiny by the media. Table 3 gives an overview of which CEOs were attacked but also praised most (> 40 statements with character attributions).

Table 3.

Frequency of character aspects attributed to CEOs in statements (by CEO).

n	Competence		Integrity		Charisma		Personal		Reliability		Prop.
n	neg\|pos		neg\|pos		neg\|pos		neg\|pos		neg\|pos		pos-neg
Ackermann	18	45	18	10	11	9	4	5	12	6	+ 12
Jain	22	38	24	14	11	24	13	7	8	9	+ 14
Fitschen	15	23	15	24	6	11	4	3	4	8	+ 25
Cryan	6	17	2	18	5	2	0	0	2	8	+ 30
Winterkorn	6	31	16	3	10	4	0	7	5	14	+ 22
Müller	8	23	5	6	11	11	6	4	2	3	+ 15
Zetsche	15	30	9	7	13	31	1	6	6	5	+ 35
Löscher	20	13	11	6	5	7	1	2	4	1	−12
Kaeser	3	17	0	7	5	18	0	0	0	1	+ 35
Terium	16	9	2	1	2	0	0	1	1	2	−8
Großmann	3	6	1	3	12	7	3	1	0	3	+ 1
Teyssen	24	18	5	3	1	10	1	5	1	1	+ 5
Spohr	1	3	1	0	2	11	1	2	2	3	+ 12
Pfeiffer	7	0	4	2	6	4	1	0	2	0	−13

N_character = 1359, CEOs with > 40 character attributions.

Interestingly, the Deutsche Bank CEOs who navigated Germany’s largest bank though various crises, are all considered rather competent. Yet, Ackermann and Jain are clearly assessed negatively regarding their integrity, while the new bearer of hope, John Cryan, received some praise in this respect. Looking at the proportion between negative and positive character assessments, we find that few of the CEOs show a negative balance, above all for, Georg Pfeiffer, who manoeuvred one of Austria’s retailers into insolvency, which lead to a significant loss of jobs, especially for women. A negative balance indicating considerable character attacks, particularly regarding his competence and integrity, can also be observed in the case of Peter Löscher, the former CEO of Siemens, who was dismissed by the board of directors after two profit warnings. These qualitative observations of character attacks and praises indicate that there may be a relationship between the appraisal of a CEO’s character and his retention in office, which leads us to RQ2.

To answer RQ2, whether there is a link between the media’s attribution of specific character and value aspects to CEOs and their perseverance in power during and after a crisis (retention), we applied the chi-square test of association. The five character aspects and four value dimensions were tested for their potential relationship with CEO retention. To work out the effect of character attacks versus character praises, we eliminated the neutral/ambivalent middle category for these analyses and focused on the negative and positive assessments of character and values.

While the chi-square test revealed no significant relationship between the character aspects of competence, reliability, and personal and CEO retention, it showed that integrity and charisma appraisals are indeed linked to a CEO’s perseverance in office during a crisis. Among those whose integrity was portrayed negatively in the media, that is, who experienced character attacks against their integrity, 66% did not remain in office versus 34% who remained. The chi-square test rendered significantly (χ² = 5.57, p < .02), yet the strength of the association is rather weak (Cramér’s V = .15). Interestingly, for charisma, we found an effect of character praise. Results reveal that of those CEOs whose charisma was portrayed positively in the media, 63% remained in office, versus 39% who did not. The chi-square test rendered significant (χ² = 4.21, p < .05); again, the strength of the association is weak (Cramér’s V = .12). The results are graphically depicted in Figure 1.

The chi-square test of association testing the relationship between value attacks or value praises respectively, and CEO retention revealed more insights for RQ2. Overall, the data revealed that values of CEOs who did not remain in office were assessed more often by the media (60%, n = 445) compared to those who remained (40%, n = 299), no matter whether the assessments were positive or negative. Looking at the specific value dimensions, we find that this effect is particularly pronounced for self-enhancement (power, achievement) and self-transcendence (benevolence, universalism). Results show that CEOs who did not remain in office were portrayed generally more often with respect to their self-enhancement values (retain = 38% vs leave = 62%) and their self-transcendence values (retain = 39% vs leave = 61%) compared to those who remained in office. Figure 2 depicts these effects.

Discussion

The study explored CA in the context of corporate communication. To address the research questions we put forward at the beginning of the paper, we conceptualized and operationalized CA with regard to the concepts of personal values and character traits as essentials in corporate leadership. We have argued that it is those dimensions of a CEOs personality that come under attack during the process of CA. The findings show that, among personal character traits, integrity and charisma are linked, albeit rather weak, to a CEOs remaining in office. The results suggest that a CEOs integrity is the foremost target for character attacks and that negative attributions of integrity are related to a CEOs forced demise. This finding is in line with Samoilenko et al.’s (2018) argument that deliberate attacks focus on public image, morals, and integrity of the person in question. Contrarily, positive attributions of charisma seem to bolster a CEO’s position, making him or her less prone to attempts of CA. Those CEOs who were positively attributed with charisma were more likely to stay in office during a crisis. Park and Berger already showed the importance of the charisma dimension in their study back in 2004 (Samoilenko et al., 2018). In addition, as suggested by Bass (1990), charisma seems to be critical for transformational leaders whose companies are in crises. Regarding the role of values, the analysis showed that the personal values of CEOs who had to leave office were under closer scrutiny than of those who remained. This points to another argument brought forward by Samoilenko et al. (2018), who suggested that in the court of public opinion, values and beliefs would be judged more thoroughly when a leader’s organization is in a state of crisis. The strong focus on the dimension of self-enhancement, which includes power and achievement, furthermore indicates that CA applies as well in the field of corporate communications as in political communication. Since CA is a method used in the struggle for power, it seems only consequent that the value itself is broached in the public arena. The focus on achievement seems to be self-evident, too. After all, CEOs are measured by the success their company has during their tenure.

Conclusion

The presented results highlight the importance of social capital in the field of corporate communications, especially during a crisis. Unlike in politics, attempts of CA might not be as fierce, intense and publicly visible as, for example, in election campaigns. But in the fight for market shares, in internal power struggles or during crises, CA in corporate communication is as much an option as in politics. Among others, Dodd et al. (2015) have argued that intangible assets such as reputation could transform into organizational outcomes. Following that logic, the positive perception of character traits and personal values could shield CEOs from character attacks, and thus shield the entire organization. Given the CEOs prominent position at the top of the corporate hierarchy, CA might well reach beyond the individual and encroach upon the company itself. The concept of CA, and thus research on the topic, is still in its early stages and constantly evolving. Therefore, empirical research, especially with regard to corporate communication, is still scarce. The presented study tried to explore the concept of CA in the field of corporate communication by analysing character attacks in news media during corporate crises. We believe that the present study provides valuable insights for scholars and practitioners. We suggest that certain character traits and personal values are antecedents that influence the outcomes of attempts of CA.

Limitations and future research

The present study has several limitations. First, due to using content analysis, we were only able to analyse character attacks – and therefore CA – indirectly. It cannot be determined by making a content analysis whether the negative attribution of character traits and personal values was deliberate and sustained, or not – a key element of CA by definition (Samoilenko et al., 2018). For example, the data suggest that former Siemens CEO Peter Löscher was the target of sustained and deliberate character attacks. However, by analysing media coverage, it cannot be stated whether the negative attributions towards Löscher were created deliberately by internal sources or not. Second, the negative assessment of traits and values are not character attacks per se. Negative attributions can be grounded on facts, for example, the negative assessment of a CEOs competence can be related to a bad company performance. Therefore, negative attributions may well be a fair journalistic assessment of a CEOs personal performance. Third, the analysis of CA in the field of business is naturally more difficult than in the field of politics. Unlike in politics, where election campaigns provide a natural habitat for (attempts of) CA and where the public generally plays a much bigger role, corporate politics happen much more behind closed doors. Politicians get elected by the general public, CEOs are chosen by the board and approved by a company’s shareholders or owners. Even though reputation is vital in both fields, it is more critical in politics than in business, where coverage is usually less frequent. Finally, the database for our analysis contains just a few valid cases. Many crisis situations of the companies under scrutiny were short and featured only few character and value attributions towards their CEOs. It seems that only major corporations such as Volkswagen, Siemens or Deutsche Bank receive a necessary critical mass of public coverage that would enable a meaningful analysis. Even though coverage on CEOs is quite frequent, the attribution of character traits and personal values is less so. Unlike in politics, where struggles for power in parties are much public, CA in corporate politics takes place behind closed doors.

Future research should therefore address CA with regard to social media, too. In social media, character attacks could be analysed on a grander scale and more directly. While newspapers mediate character attacks (mostly) through journalists, on social media attacks could be staged by players themselves using platforms like Facebook and Twitter, and thus be observed firsthand. Furthermore, the study of CA should also focus on researching effects by using experimental designs. Our results demonstrate that certain character traits and personal values might play a key role when it comes to attempts of CA – for example, integrity, charisma and self-enhancement – during or in the aftermath of an organizational crisis. Thus, it would be important to further enhance the understanding of the role perceived character traits and perceived values play among key stakeholders, such as employees, customers or investors. Apart from the question whether an attempted CA was successful and thus led to the demise of the individual CEO, the effects on the groups mentioned above – such as changes in purchase behaviour, identification or self-perception – are unknown. Hence, a deeper knowledge of and insights into the mechanisms that govern the process of CA in corporate communications and its implications for the entire organization should be the focus of future research.

Footnotes

Appendix

Appendix 2.

CEOs.

Company	CEO	Status as CEO	Retention
Daimler	Zetsche	still in office (since January 2006)	yes
Deutsche Bahn	Grube	still in office (since May 2009)	yes
Deutsche Bank	Cryan	still in office (since July 2015)	yes
	Fitschen	had to resign early (stayed until May 2016)	no
	Jain	had to resign early (June 2015)	no
	Ackermann	resigned early (May 2012) and dismisses controversial move to board of directors	no
EON	Teyssen	still in office (since May 2010)	yes
	Bernotat	contract ended (April 2010)	yes
Karstadt	Jennings	did not renew contract in crisis (Dec 2013)	no
	Fanderl	still in office (since Oct 2014)	yes
Lufthansa	Spohr	still in office (since May 2014)	yes
	Franz	contract ended (May 2014)	yes
	Mayrhuber	contract ended (Dec 2010)	yes
RWE	Terium	still in office (since July 2012)	yes
	Großmann	resigned early (June 2012)	no
Siemens	Kaeser	still in office (since Aug 2013)	yes
	Löscher	made to leave early (July 2013)	no
Volkswagen	Müller	still in office (since Sept 2015)	yes
	Winterkorn	resigned from office amid the emissions scandal (Sept 2015)	no
OMV	Roiss	resigned early (June 2015)	no
	Seele	still in office (since July 2015)	yes
	Ruttenstorfer	left office regularly (March 2011)	yes
Bank Austria	Cernko	pushed out early (Feb 2016)	no
Strabag	Birtel	still in office (since June 2013)	yes
	Haselsteiner	Resigned early for age-reasons (June 2013)	yes
Zielpunkt (former subsidiary of Pfeiffer Group)	Pfeiffer	sold Zielpunkt after insolvency (still in office as owner of Pfeiffer Group)	no
Zielpunkt (former subsidiary of Pfeiffer Group)	Schönleitner	left Zielpunkt after insolvency (still in office at Pfeiffer Group)	no

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

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