Q&A: What to Look for in a Reputation Management Specialist

With the increasing challenges associated with monitoring and maintaining reputation, more organizations are considering hiring a reputation management professional. Here's what you need to know about this role.

What is reputation management and why is it important for healthcare organizations today?

Having a reputation management pro on staff is vital, says Tim Langhorst, vice president of executive communications and reputation management at ProMedica, a nonprofit 13-hospital health system based in Toledo, Ohio. "It's a hybrid position of legal, HR, and risk management—and it's a position that's becoming more needed," he says.

A reputation management specialist should be able to anticipate the broad spectrum of consequences that are possible for any action their hospital takes, from failing to properly address a patient's angry comment on Yelp to helping to craft a response to a lawsuit to weighing in on a proposed new logo.

As healthcare moves to a more consumer-oriented market, the importance of reputation will only grow—and hospital leaders cannot rest on their laurels, even if they have a solid century-old reputation. It's now vital to address issues that could negatively affect the organization's reputation.

In a brief discussion we had, Langhorst lays out a reputation management specialist's role, and describes a qualified professional candidate. This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.

HealthLeaders Media: Tim, can you tell me what a reputation management professional's job entails?

Tim Langhorst: It depends on the day, but mostly we're trying to help the organization be a little more sensitive. Branding and reputation are so closely intertwined. As reputation management professionals, we're trying to help build reputations and relationships, while trying to do the right thing for the community at the same time.

Reputation management specialists look at different ways to build a reputation for the organization. I don't think a lot of people really think about that. When most people hear the reputation management professional title, I think they usually think of issues and crisis management, but people are taking someone who focuses on reputation more seriously these days, and asking more how to build a reputation. I spend as much of my time thinking about that as how we manage issues.

ProMedica believes in a philosophy of healthy communities and individuals. As an organization, we take a broader view related to that. This includes the social determinates of health, such as hunger as a health issue, infant mortality, mental health, and behavioral health, and how social determinants like poverty, shelter, and education really impact the health of a community. One of my duties is keeping our organization focused on how we can improve on making connections related to those issues. It's not only the right thing to do for the community, but it also helps to build the reputation of the organization.

There are also the more traditional issues management and crisis management aspects to the job as well.

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HLM: What are some personal characteristics of a good reputation management professional?

Langhorst: I think a reputation management professional needs to have good critical thinking skills. They need to understand the industry, and in a broader sense than just public relations or issues management; they need to understand perspectives like finance, operations, legal, and HR. They need to understand the nuances of different support areas so that they can provide the best counsel and advice possible.

I think they need to understand that this role is more than PR, and understand how all different aspects of the organization act and how they cause impact.

I think a reputation management professional needs to be a good listener, and they need to understand nuance—and what the real issue is. Often, someone might say that they have an issue with one thing, while what's really upsetting them is something completely different, and a reputation management professional should be good at getting to the heart of the matter.

And this person should be able to get the right people in the room. Reputation management is such a group effort—it's not just something I do, everyone in the system responsible.

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But, first and foremost, you have to be an honest person who can focus on always doing the right thing. You have to be willing to say to your CEO, "This is the right thing to do. This will be hard, but we made a mistake, and here's how we're going to fix it."

HLM: What professional background and training should a reputation management professional have?

Langhorst: Honestly, there's not a lot of schools that do a great job in training someone to do reputation management. The ideal candidate is going to be someone who knows something about legal, PR, HR, ops—all of those different areas. And that's kind of a unique individual.

As for my background—and this was 30 or 40 years ago—my undergraduate degree was in education, and I did work toward a master's degree in English, although I did not complete that degree.

HLM: When looking at resumes when selecting a new reputation management professional, what are you looking for?

Langhorst: That's a tough one, because it's a very senior position to begin with. I don't know that there would be anybody who would be right out of school and ready to take that kind of role on.

I might consider someone who could demonstrate that they could create kind of a proactive reputation building and reputation management program, and, through the interview, ensure that they have an understanding of what crisis management means, and what reputation management and issues management mean. I'd also be interested in hearing their thoughts about how they would monitor and utilize social media relative to getting a sense of reputation trends, and how social media can be used to help build communities and increase reputation capital.

This candidate would have to really be able to analyze issues from multiple perspectives and have an anticipatory ability to think about possible issues that might arise in the future, and work with senior leaders in helping to anticipate and create action plans against those issues.

An ideal candidate would need an understanding of connectiveness between reputation and branding, because they are so interconnected in so many ways, and how they would measure the success of the reputation and things of that nature.

Join Tim Langhorst for a HealthLeaders Media webcast, "Building Reputation, Managing Risk—ProMedica's Model" on Wednesday, November 4, at 1:00 -2:00 PM ET.