What about the image of Senegal?
Water scarcity in Senegal has earned the country to appear in the international media. What are the consequences on the image of Senegal?
Due to the rupture of a pipeline, the city of Dakar and its surroundings has been deprived of water for several weeks. Some 40% of people to be more precise. “Unbelievable, unacceptable, shameful”… qualifiers have not failed in the media and among the Senegalese people, to describe the situation.
It even seemed important enough to attract the international media, especially those dealing with Africa. Beyond the problem itself (questioning the service contract, infrastructure architecture …), what are the consequences on the country’s image?
In fact, when we talk about image, we first think of the organizations image (businesses, public organisms, associations) or personality’s image etc… But countries are also involved. They are a form of organization and their image follows roughly the same rules as the others one.
The image of an organization
Let’s briefly remind the definition of the image, its main areas of perception and its components. The image of an organization is a sort of photograph of that one at a specific time. It is therefore changing, measured through surveys and studies and is characterized by various lines of perceptions, such as:
- Awareness: being more or less known.
- Reputation: good or bad, with shading, the reputation is particularly expressed by adjectives that immediately come to the spirit of the “respondents”.
- Values: What are the values attached to organization?
- Identity: it is define by the organization activities, its story, its employees (population for a country), and its emblems.
- Personality: define by its actions, its leaders speeches for example.
We can see that image doesn’t only mean reputation. The image is additional: it is the sum of its perceptions and also of its components:
- Institutional: the image given by the organization towards institutions, its opinion leaders (elected officials, government agencies, professional organizations, journalists …). Remark: An organization can become an institution.
- Professional: define by its professional activities.
- Relational: The different relationships between the organization and its stakeholders.
- Emotional: emotional ties, capital sympathy.
To be quick, the main concern for working on the Image will be to create, to maintain a globally positive image and to gain a capital sympathy. We are not going to list the consequences of a positive or a negative image here, because there are a lot of them.
Let’s get back to our topic, Senegal! Regarding the short presentation above, we can notice that the perceptions and the components of the Image in general, can be apply to a country. Let’s complete our definition by precising that the image, most of the time, is simplified (The human brain has a trend to simplify, memorize clichés instead), persistent (mainly negative image: it can take years to restore a good image), comparative (competitors), and above all, relative: the image depend on the stakeholder, its link with the organization for example.
A tarnished image
So, image quid of Senegal? We are not going to do it here: it’s your turn, according to the points raise above, to define your own image of the country! It will be, of course, incomplete. Then, if you are not part of it, try to put yourself in the shoes of a foreigner, a potential tourist, an investor or a contractor. Due to the recent events (water scarcity along with power cuts!), will you say that the image of Senegal is globally positive and will you plan to spend your holidays or even invest money in here? A group of representatives of the French Employers (MEDEF) was visiting Dakar during the water shortage period…
According to us, it’s obvious that the image of Senegal has suffer from this event. The country has lost lot of scores and is, without doubt, less attractive… because of a pipeline… Crisis management and Crisis communication may be the subjects of another long article, but they certainly have not helped improving things.