North Port Klang Corporate Communication

MBA IN PUBLIC RELATIONS AND COMMUNICATION

MCP 304 practical application in Public

relations

Name Student ID#Mohamad Tarek AlBitar110035067

Oyuntugs Luvsansambuu 110036795

Academic Honesty Policy Statement

I, hereby attest that contents of this attachment are my own work.Referenced works, articles, art, programs, papers or parts thereofare acknowledged at the end of this paper. This includes dataexcerpted from CD-ROMs, the Internet, other private networks, andother people’s disk of the computer system.

Student’s Signature : _____________________________

LECTURER’S COMMMENTS/GRADE:for office use only

DATE : ______________

Practical Application in PR

Title : Corporate communication application on the North Port (klang)

Due Date : wed 15 Jan 2014

TIME : ________________

RECEIVER’S NAME : _______


Contents............................................................1MBA IN PUBLIC RELATIONS AND COMMUNICATION.................1

1.Introduction:….............................................41.1.Objective and scope of the study:…….....................4

1.2.Executive Summary of the Study……........................52.The Body of the study:…....................................6

2.1.The company profile:…...................................62.2.LITRATURE REVIEW:…......................................8

2.3.Applying Corporate Communication on the (Klang) Northport:….. 11

2.3.1.The Role of the Strategic Advisor/ Copywriter Executive:…… 11

2.3.2.The Required skills of the position of (SCA):……....112.3.3.The Specific Areas which Strategic Advisor Advices the CEO Around:…… 12

2.3.4.The Technology affecting the profession:.............17

References:.................................................18


1.Introduction:

1.1. Objective and scope of the study:

The objective of this study is to show what is corporate

communication and how corporate communication is been

done on real business environment, thus it will high

light some theories about the corporate communication,

however more concentration will be held in the practical

part that will be explored from the record of the

interview with an on the field person who is the

communication strategic advisor of the Klang North Port.

Additionally this study aims to have critical analysis of

the theoretical issue and how the theory is being

implemented in the previously mentioned organization, and

therefore will have a live model to deal with and apply

all the (class), theories on the real ground.

The scope of this study is deep because it does not only

explore the theories of communication, but also it go

through all the parts and pieces of the real world


communication career to have a further understanding

about the following:

How the real corporate communication is been done?

Who are the responsible people about the

communication?

What are their actual roles, and;

How they implement these roles specifically to get

their objectives done, within the broad objectives

of the organization which could be summarized in the

VMG, (vision, Mission, and Goals).

1.2. Executive Summary of the Study:

This study is prepared by an MBA Public Relations and

communication, students of Limkokwing University of

Creative Technology (LUCT) for the purpose of summarizing

and reporting the corporate communication.

The report inside this research will show both literature

reviews for the theoretical part, as well as will high

light the most important issues discussed in the


interview with MR Ravindran Raman Kutty, the

communication strategic advisor for the CEO of Klang

Northport in the date of Friday the 10th of January 2014.

Therefore the research will include highlighting the

theoretical part of communication that the students took

in the class, and then try to apply theory into practice

within the details that have been given and recorded

within the interview.

The first upcoming chapter of this study will be the

corporate profile in a summary, to understand what the

studied business is, in order to know what the needed

communication requirements are.

The second chapter will be the theoretical aspects of the

corporate communication, and what are the fads and

theories of the corporate communication with highlighting

the significant role that the corporate communication

plays in generating the publicity of the organization and

how it shapes its public image.

The third chapter of the study will be the summarizing of

the interview with giving the required details, in

addition this report will show why the corporate levels

have to communicate, when they have to communicate, how

they should communicate, and the most important to whom

they should direct their communication toward.

The third chapter as well will give a background of how

the corporate using the new technologies such as social


media web sites to facilitate and organize the

communication issues.

Finally the conclusion will include some academic

recommendation that the team of students who wrote this

study are suggesting to have a possible more flexible,

effective, and efficient communication process, and

methods through the daily working routine.

2.The Body of the study:

2.1. The company profile:

According to Bursa Malaysia, Northport is owned and

operated by Northport (Malaysia) Bhd and comprises

dedicated multipurpose port facilities and services.

The Northport entity was a merger of two companies;

Kelang Container Terminal (KCT) and Kelang Port

Management (KPM). Its operations also cover South Port,

which was renamed South point for conventional cargo

handling, and acquired Northport Distripark Sdn Bhd

(NDSB) as part of its logistics division.

According to North port official website the company's;

Vision is "to become the main gateway and leading

regional hub for maritime trade by 2020".

Mission: is "to achieve highest standards of safety

and quality in cargo handling by providing state-of-


the-art infrastructure and systems for total

customer satisfaction".

While their core values according to them are the:

"Customer Focus, Teamwork, Expertise,

Resourcefulness, Result Oriented, Communication, and

Integrity".

The CEO's MR. Abi Sofian Abdul Hamid massage is another

announcement that this report should highlight to know

how corporate communication is going within the North

Port:

"It has been a year since I was entrusted to helm and lead TEAMNORTHPORT.

It has indeed been a challenging twelve months in spite of me having spent

the previous 19 years in the port environment. With all the support from

many people including the Board of Directors of both NMB and NCB Holdings

Bhd, the customers and other stakeholders and more importantly members

of TEAMNORTHPORT, the last twelve months was just like yesterday. During

this period we have moved along some parts of the roads less travelled, if not

totally unchartered territories. There have been long hours spent to

understand the Vision, Mission and our own functions and roles.

There have been pain with sweat to understand our own worth and values to

the organization as well as to ourselves by coming up with our own sets of

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) as we move to the next level of excellence in

the high performance work environment. In all these, lie the biggest key to

our success that is being given the best opportunity to contribute towards our

own destiny.


We now understand how critical it is to live to the highest standard of service

delivery in giving Total Customer Satisfaction to our customers and business

partners. An unhappy customer is the beginning of the end for our future. We

have no option, really. In the face of choppy waters it is either we manage our

sails or allow ourselves to drift away. When we profess that Change Begins

With me, we are in fact telling ourselves to think and act differently in a better

way. It is either we pull our socks and soldier on to change or be ignorant of

the changing surrounding and be changed instead. Any soldier worth his or

her sweat will never accept falling by the way side. In this regard, we all

should wear our logo with honor and valor. In short the time has now come

for us to execute our agreed strategies and action plans. We need to grow our

business to get more revenues. We need to be more productive, efficient and

urgent to optimize our resources and reduce costs. We need to take genuine

ownership of all our work processes to reduce wastages, leakages and more

importantly to ensure we work safely. We need to enhance our governance as

corporate citizens to build a more disciplined and respectable

TEAMNORTHPORT. We ought to give due respect to our fellow members of

TEAMNORTHPORT to remove cross functional barriers. In short we need to

rejuvenate ourselves with our core values of being resourceful, practicing our

expertise, focusing on our customers, working together as a team all the time

and effectively communicating with each other with full integrity to get the

desired results. A good member of TEAMNORTHPORT is also a good citizen of

our beloved nation, Malaysia. Insya Allah with these qualities we may yet

again sail through even a perfect storm.


Let us come together to realize our Vision and Mission. For the trust and

support in the last twelve months and in the coming months I would like to

convey my utmost appreciation and heartfelt thanks to each and every one

member of TEAMNORTHPORT and all stakeholders. To our customers and

business partners, I would like to thank for the continued support and

readiness to be on board our challenging journey. Rest assured we will create

and have our due excitement for a better tomorrow in not too distant future".

2.2. LITRATURE REVIEW:

Organizations use corporate communication to carry

identity, perform branding and to save and develop

reputation. Therefore strategic corporate communication

is used to minimize the stakeholder uncertainty as much

as possible, and to develop the relationships with the

stakeholders at all levels. Throughout the expansion of

healthy relationships where there is a mutual ground

and, confidence, mutuality and partnership, participant

organizations are better placed to achieve their aims,

whether they are normative (such as social contracts,

environmental duties, public acceptance) or

contributory (such as income, sales, return on

investment (ROI), and high efficient and effective

performance).

Where there are middle-of-the-road or negative

relationships, or a gap between personality and image,


corporate communication has to put more efforts in

order to thin the break. For example, organizations

(X), used corporate communication to help change the

way employees involve with the organization following a

period important strategic ambiguity.

Exploring the opportunity of any topic can often be

started by investigating the definitions provided by

scholars who have studied the topic as a

specialization.

Several definitions exist and highlighted here, across

the period 1987 to 2007. Even though there are

numerous texts in which corporate communication makes a

considerable contribution, the focus is often on

reputation and brand building activities.

In these situations corporate communication is not

distinct. The following definitions have been

recognized in corporate communication texts. These are

not the whole books and definitions on this subject but

they are the most considered to be representative of

many of the important authors and academics in this

area.

“Corporate communication is the total communication activity generated

by a company to achieve its planned objectives” (Jackson, 1987).


“the aggregate of sources, messages and media by which the corporation

conveys its uniqueness or brand to its various audiences” Gray (1995:

254)

Corporate communication is an instrument of management by means of

which all consciously used forms of internal and external communication

are harmonized as effectively and efficiently as possible, so as to create a

favourable basis for relationships with groups upon which the company is

dependent (Riel van, 1995: 26).

“Corporate communication is the set of activities involved in managing

and orchestrating all internal and external communications aimed at

creating favourable starting points with stakeholders on which the

company depends. Corporate communication consists of the

dissemination of information by a variety of specialists and generalists in

an organization, with the common goal of enhancing the organization’s

ability to retain its license to operate” (Riel van and Fombrun,

2007: 25).

In the two books in which van Riel proposals his

definitions, pressure is given to the significance of

using the particular method of communication, a

position introduced by Jackson (1987). This, it is

argued, emphasizes the integrative role of

communication rather than suggest a propagation of

approaches (p25). This stance echoed by Cornelissen

(2008).

“Corporate communication is a management function that offers a

framework for the effective coordination of all internal and external


communication with the overall purpose of establishing and maintaining

favorable reputations with stakeholder groups upon which the

organization is dependent” (Cornelissen, 2008:5).

Cornelissen admits the complication related with

corporate communication and he also stresses the

significance of longsighted corporate communication as

an integrative role.

Corporate communication is not the same as public

relations and other particular communication

activities, such as branding, media relations and

internal communications. Cornelissen regards corporate

communication as a means of overpass over these

professional activities in order to “harness the

strategic interests of the organisation at large”

(2008: 6).

This view is not common with Lowensberg (2006: 253). He

reflects the term corporate communications means the

same as organizational public relations, and prefers

the latter as the word corporate can be

misrepresentative and suggests an applicability to

profit only ‘corporations’.

Apart from an increasing word amount as definitions

emerge, an examination reveals a gradual change in

orientation. From what is essentially an inward

perspective proposed by Jackson in 1987, Cornelissen’s

view twenty years later, stresses the significance of


the reputation with which the organization is observed

by stakeholders.

The organization itself is observed to be the self-

serving focus for Jackson’s perspective of corporate

communication. For Cornelissen, the organization

conducts corporate communication in order to build

reputation and keep it safe, while the desire to remain

subservient to the wishes of the vital stakeholders.

2.3. Applying Corporate Communication on the (Klang) Northport:

First of all reader have to understand that all the

provided information is exclusive and not mentioned in

the website of the organization and it is a resulting of

group interview recording for two important staff in the

corporate office whom are; (the Strategic communication

adviser MR. Ravindran Raman Kutty, and the Copywriter

Executive MRS. Nur Sheila Shaari Balakrishna, therefore

the references should be for those two people in addition

to their responsibility of the mentioned information.

2.3.1. The Role of the Strategic Advisor/ Copywriter Executive:

The position tasks is shortly to advise the CEO about

how and in which direction the strategic communication

should lead the company, and try to improve the positions


of the North Port in the ranking among the international

competitor ports. Therefore one of the job specifications

is to ensure that the wanted message delivered to the

right audience and to wait for the feed-back to ensure

that the communication actions are doing its correct

purposes, additionally to manage all the coming in and

going out flows of communication in a harmonized manner,

in other words to make sure that publics on a different

levels get the right signal and the right massage, and

eliminate all possible and potential misleading

communication that could be generated accidently.

While the copywriter executive job is to take care of all

the publications of the organizations, such as posters,

news, website, press release, reports, and Social Media

publications, in another words she is responsible about

every single written word that comes out from the

organization as a form of communication toward publics.

2.3.2. The Required skills of the position of (SCA):

The advisor stated that any communication Practitioner

have to hold two basic skills;

o The writing skills: and he stated that he have to

write always and about any topic not only business

related to stay in the game and keep himself updated

with all new fads and topics, in order to

communicate well in the future.


o The speaking skills: which according to the advisor

is critical and could be used in Media relations,

presentation, employee speaks, corporate meetings

and other methods of communication, thus he advised

all the prospective practitioner to train themselves

well on both the writing and speaking skills.

o Other attitudes such as being extrovert, smiling,

social, and be always updated on what is going on,

and read on many topics to know how to deal with

divers mentalities.

2.3.3. The Specific Areas which Strategic Advisor Advices the CEO Around:

A. The Media Relations:

Which means to ensure that all the types of media

(print, TV, Radio, Social Media, and electronic

publishers), are fed with favorable and wanted

messages about the port, (and by the right favorable

message we mean the message that serve and go along

with the VMG Vision, Mission, and Goals, of the

port).

Reader should note that as mentioned in the

interview Media Relation, requires the Role of the


Copywriter Executive position as well as the

position of the advisor, because it will help to

prepare the content that Media will publish later,

thus the Media relations need as well a Person to

monitor the local, regional, and also the global

media to stay updated with the world news, and knows

what is going on.

Additionally sometimes media monitoring could be

outsourced to a privet specialized agency, to save

costs, and efforts.

After monitoring the media the Advisor will make a

summary including all the news that have interest

with the industry, and gives the summarized report

to the CEO.

B. Crises Communications:

Reader should understand that in such business like

the port there are many possibilities of having

serious crises such as: natural crises, terrorist

attacks through container, smuggling some materials

that could bring national risks and others work

accidents. Then since the Corporate office cannot

control these kinds of events, but still they can

try to control the news generated from such an eventPractical Application in PR

and contain the crises to save their organizational

reputation.

So in such a scenario you should try to isolate the

event zone and try to not ignore but instead manage

the different media reporters who come to the event

zone, and tell them the story that you want (in

another word manage their assumptions and

understanding).

Answering the question asked by one of the

interviewer is it your responsibility to Face the

Media in a scenario of crises, or your job is ony to

advise the CEO, are you the spoke person of the

organization?

The advisor stated: "we in North Port created the

standard operating procedure (SOP), which clearly

stated that the CEO must be the figure of the brand,

and he should be the spoke person of the company,

however in case of he is not there in the time of

the crisis the strategic advisor role become as a

spoke person",

C. Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR):

It is according to the Advisor about how the

organization is contributing to the well-being back

into the society that they are operating in.


Therefore in North Port he stated " we are trying to

make sure that our neighbors are happy", meaning

customers, and every entity that is using logistics,

in another word the people whom every day deal with

the organization.

And how they make them happy by ensuring that the

environment they have to face is well-taken care of,

such as; (roads, trees, water, and the containers

area, and the overall environment to be clean).

D. Stakeholders Management:

By this they mean ensuring to deliver the right

massage, to the right party, in a right manner, and

using the right tool.

The strategic advisor has to communicate almost

every day of the year with these stakeholders, and

this communication is done via (emails, Facebook,

twitter, mobile calls, letters, SMS, blogs,

mediums), and to deliver each the massage that carry

their interest inside, or in a different expression,


the message that encode a matter of their concern,

each stakeholder by his/her position.

Then one responsibility of the advisor is to ensure

that the message (seen, heard, read, or even felt

right) as it was planned before it sent.

Thus as a communication facilitator the strategic

advisor classified the stakeholders into two

classifications as the following:

o Primary stakeholders: This includes the people

who directly contribute to the profits of the

organization, meaning (local customers,

international customers, employees, board of

directors, the owners of the company, the

contractors, the government of Malaysia, and

the Media).

o While the secondary stakeholder: are the

people and entities which indirectly affect

the profits, and return on investment (ROI),

of the organization. Meaning (societies,

universities, scholars, Non-Governmental

Organizations (NGO's), Community based

organizations (CBO's), suppliers.


E. Employee Communication and Relations:

The advisor stated that the failure or success of

any particular business is relaying actually on

people, and by saying people he meant the employees

within the company, he stated that employee are key

success factor not only for the north port but also

for any other business or brand.

In this job the department has to make sure that the

employee understands clearly the goals of

organization and his/her behavior as an individual

is affecting the overall performance of the

organization. Additionally employees have to follow

some codes of conduct and behavior, with showing

productivity and this could be done better when

combined with the proper communication the advisor

stated.

The main goal of this job is to motivate employees

to increase their efficiency and effectiveness,

which resulted in improvement in performance not

only individually based but also on the base of the

overall performance of the organization.


Additionally to motivating employees they also

needed to be inspired and encourage being more

creative and this could create a competitive

advantage for the organization, and this is making

it stands in the global competitiveness.

The advisor stated that due to the large number of

employees the CEO is using the Social Media to

communicate to them, and as scholars we see this

approach as an efficient (Mass Communication), due

to the saving of effort, money and time.

Another important statement made by the advisor that

the nature of the CEO of the north port which is

consciousness and caring for his employees is

positively affecting the general environment of the

workplace and the by the nature result, the overall

performance, and the participative leadership style

that he is following is considered to be

contributing positively to the overall strategic

planning of the organization.

An intercepting with the human resources department,

the advisor stated that in a such hard time for the

Malaysian economy as a part of the global economies


dominant, North Port gave (3.5-5%) bounce to the

employee, communicating to them that the corporate

level are really concerning for you and thankful for

your efforts.

The advisor stated that his job includes advising

the Human Capital department, and he gave the

information that the organization is doing a

training program for one year period called (change

begins with me), and as an analyzer we have to state

that such a self-improvement activity is important

to communicate with employees the overall message of

that is to say to the employees: "when we grow as an

organization, will lead you to grow together as

employees", and this to reduce the turnover rate.

F. The Branding:

Because North Port is public listed company, they

have to fulfill certain requirements, there for

every brand should have a persona without a persona;

the brand could be useless, or weak. And by persona

we mean personality like each and every well-known

person, and in Northport they are working around

their CEO personality. The advisor answered some of the interviewers

question said:


We are not that popular, but however we are planning

to make our-self more known; this means they are

trying to increase their publicity, and this by

efficiency the advisor stated, because efficiency is

very critical in creating your publicity as a well-

known port, another issue to increase the publicity

is the productivity. Without forgetting the reputation of the

administration in creating your own publicity,

quality, safety, health, and another components to

create the publicity.

He stated that branding and quality are basically

the same thing, thus you cannot brand useless

product or service.

2.3.4. The Technology affecting the profession:

Answering to one of the interviewer questions how did the

technology in general , or more specifically the social

media affect your roles as a communication advisor and

facilitator?

The advisor answered we are in the times of speed and the

Social media is saving our efforts and time to do

communication;


o Facebook: we are currently communicating to our

employees Via the North Port page which allow us to

do mass communication (arrangements, bounce

announcements, policies announcements, and others)

to those large number of audience (three shifts

employees), that our CEO's concern the most.

o Twitter: we basically are talking to our customers

and say how successfully we are performing, and how

many moves we made), basically all the good and

pleasant news.

References:

Cornelissen, J. (2008) Corporate communication: theory and

practice, 2e, London: Sage

Gray, E. (1995) Corporate Image as a strategic concept.

In Proceedings of the 13th Annual Conference of the

Association of Management, Vancouver, 250-7

Jackson, P. (1987) Corporate communication for Managers,

London: Pitman


Lowensberg, D. (2006) Corporate image, reputation and

identity, in Exploring Public Relations, Tench and Yeomans (Eds)

p250-264, Harlow: Financial Times: Prentice Hall

North Port announcements on Bursa Malaysia could be found

at:

http://announcements.bursamalaysia.com/EDMS/subweb.nsf/al

l/0832938437F998E748256AD50029B047/$File/NCB-Cover-

Content-Definitions-LetterToShareholders.pdf Data

accessed (Jan 2014).

North Port official website could be found at:

http://www.northport.com.my/npv2/mission&vision.html Data

accessed (Jan 2014).

Personal interview Copywriter Executive MRS. Nur Sheila Shaari Balakrishna, 06031698888, [email protected].

Personal interview with MR Ravindran Raman Kutty, the communication strategic advisor for the CEO, 06031698888,[email protected].

Riel van, C. B. M. and Fombrun, C. J. (2007) Essentials of

Corporate communication, London: Routledge

Riel van, C.B.M. (1995) Principles of Corporate

communication, Hemel Hempstead: Prentice Hall


mailto:[email protected]

mailto:[email protected]

http://www.northport.com.my/npv2/mission&vision.html

http://announcements.bursamalaysia.com/EDMS/subweb.nsf/all/0832938437F998E748256AD50029B047/$File/NCB-Cover-Content-Definitions-LetterToShareholders.pdf



North Port Klang Corporate Communication

Documents

Transcript of North Port Klang Corporate Communication