Relationships are the core value for organisations : A practitioner perspective

Purpose – To examine how relations with social groups, including shareholders, customers, employees and vendors among other stakeholders are pivotal to generating wealth and optimising long‐term shareholder value. Design/methodology/approach – The paper explores the values intrinsic in stakeholder relations and examines why it should be included in the core of evaluation, auditing and management of organisations to create wealth, value and corporate profit. Findings – The concept of organisations with values that extend from physical assets, intellectual property, process, know‐how, knowledge brand and reputation attributes is understood as being part of the value of companies. Stakeholder relationships are intangible assets and there is a significant body of opinion that identifies intangible assets as a major driver in the global economy, corporate survival and success. There is a pivotal management role in relationship management which is the lever by which value from intangibles is optimised. Originality/value – Describes how, for companies in the twenty‐first century, the creation of value increasingly depends on intangible assets such as knowledge, systems, data, intellectual property, brands and market relationships. This opens up a new area of public relations practice whereby public relations managers take responsibility for the creation of value through relationships throughout organisations.