Good and bad, a reputation expands in use

05 May Good and bad, a reputation expands in use

Reading Time: 3 minutes

When you say someone has a reputation for something, what do you mean? Whether it’s positive or negative, a reputation is generally when people share what they repeatedly hear or see and come to know about you from things you do. Either from personal experience or via others. They’re super friendly and helpful. He’s always late for meetings. She speaks her mind.

Common to a collective or individual reputation is how it expands in use. Good and bad both impacting far past the initial action.

We can all think of examples where someone or a company does something that causes an ‘I didn’t think that’s what they stood for’ reaction and resulting in “damage to their reputation” news coverage. But it doesn’t have to land on the front page to wreak havoc. Interestingly, calling out activity as boosting a reputation is less reported or discussed.

Which is one reason I was intrigued by the idea outlined by Shane Parrish in his article “The Reputational Cue Ball.” He says,

Your reputation isn’t just what people say about you—it’s the position from which you make every move.

While most people understand that reputation matters, few recognize how it functions as a strategic asset that either unlocks opportunities or leaves you perpetually trapped. The mechanics of this process mirror an unlikely source of wisdom: the game of billiards.

A master billiards player approaches the table with dual vision. While amateurs focus solely on pocketing the immediate shot, professionals focus on how the current shot positions them for the next one. This deceptively simple insight—that present moves determine future options—perfectly captures how reputations function in our interconnected world.

I’ll raise Parrish’s position of reputation as a ‘strategic asset’. As a social capital that transfers value to a brand, it’s more fluid. So it’s well worth considering how your standing can grow or shrink the available future choices. A brand overflowing makes everything easier. Depleted—well, the cue balls become harder and harder to pocket.

And while he’s talking about the future impact of an action on reputation, our interconnected attention has exponentially changed the speed it travels. When I can hear or read about you one repost, five likes, and two time zones distant from the point of experience of the person who bought something or worked for you. The stakes get higher.

So, don’t limit talking and thinking about it to when you’ve called in the crisis comms experts. Outside of a line item on the company risk register, when was the last time reputation walked into the meeting before something happened?

Whatever your reputation is for, and the variables are as wide and deep as things people do. It reaches across groups. The customer who loves your company for doing what it says becomes an investor. The employee who didn’t work out warns everyone they talk to about how poorly you treated them on their way out the door. The supplier who always has to hassle you for payment cancels your credit account and warns others about you.

When people talk about a ‘strong’ brand, there’s usually a chunk of reputation in the mix. And from that angle, reputation also serves as a decent proxy for how much value you do have stored. I don’t think it’s possible to have both a robust reputation and a bankrupt brand. Simply, when you trade your reputation for short-term gains or a momentary win. You lose.

Back to billiards. Getting the black in the right corner pocket means you either got lucky or kept an eye on the impact of your choices. Reputations are made over time and thousands of actions and get destroyed in an instant by one. You might get lucky. It’s better to think ahead.

Thanks for reading.