آیا متخصصان روابط عمومی مسائل مربوط به حاکمیت شرکتی را به اندازه کافی برای مشاوره دادن به شرکت‌ها در مورد مدیریت روابط با ذی نفعان، درک می‌کنند؟

• Senior public relations practitioners’ knowledge on corporate governance is limited, but they acknowledge its importance.• Six role functions are proposed for managing stakeholder relationships on a strategic or managerial level.• These role functions are aligned with the King III principles on stakeholder relationship management in support of corporate governance efforts.The King Reports on Governance for South Africa are internationally respected for proposing integrated reporting in a triple bottom-line business context to improve corporate governance. The most recent report, King III, views stakeholder relationship management as a key tenet of corporate governance. This raises the question whether public relations professionals (PRPs) understand the principles of corporate governance well-enough to inform and guide organizations on the management of stakeholder relationships. The views of senior PRPs at selected top performing companies were elicited on their practice of stakeholder relationship management in line with corporate governance principles. It was found that their knowledge on corporate governance was limited, although they recognized its importance. They propose six role functions for managing stakeholder relationships on a strategic or managerial level; these role functions are aligned with the King III principles on stakeholder relationships. The following three were of particular importance: developing a corporate strategy, giving advice to senior management and managing crisis communication. Different terminologies were used to build relations with stakeholders and different approaches were used to profile stakeholders. It is recommended that organizations leverage their public relations functions on strategic and managerial levels in support of their corporate governance efforts. In turn, PRPs are encouraged to ensure a deep knowledge on corporate governance issues when counseling senior management on building stakeholder relationships.