Employee Rebranding The Case of Vivacom

Master’s thesis within International Marketing

Author: Denitsa Velikova

Georgina Todorova

Tutor: Adele Berndt

Jönköping May 2012

Master’s Thesis in International Marketing

Title: Employee Rebranding: The Case of Vivacom

Author: Denitsa Velikova, Georgina Todorova

Tutor: Adele Berndt

Date: 2012-05-14

Subject terms: Corporate branding, corporate rebranding, employee branding, employee resistance, internal communication, internal marketing, psychological contract, service branding

Abstract

Problem: Rebranding in the services is a recent trend, which brings focus to the impor-tance of the employees in this process. Their attitudes, perceptions and views need to be considered by the management when creating the internal communication strategy related to the rebranding in order to direct the employees to the desired brand image. This raises the problem as how employees perceive the management`s rebranding efforts.

Purpose: This study aims to focus on how rebranding is executed and communicated in-ternally to the employees of the company. It is interesting to find out how the employees evaluate the communication strategy that the management implements and how they perceive the new image of the company. In order to get insight to the internal rebranding process the correlation between the perceived image by the employees and the components of the internal communication strategy is presented.

Methodology: The empirical approach is a case study of the Bulgarian telecommunication company Vivacom. The research includes two interviews with the management of the company and a questionnaire based on the interviews and the relevant literature, which was sent to the employees of the company. Moreover, company`s documentation and website were used to complement the information.

Conclusions: The results helped us identify the decisions that the management made re-garding the rebranding and the internal communication. The quantitative data indicated the relatively positive attitudes and views of the employees for the management`s rebranding efforts. They also showed good knowledge and awareness of the new brand elements.

Acknowledgements

Firstly, we would like to sincerely thank Vivacom and especially Adriyana Mihaylova, Simona Tcharak-chieva and Stiliyana Stancheva for their kind and patient cooperation and contribution to this thesis. Se-condly, we would like to express our deepest gratitude to our supervisor Adele Berndt for all her support and guidance during the semester. Furthermore, we are also thankful to all our teachers and colleagues at JIBS who also gave their contribution for successfully delivering a master`s thesis. Finally, we are grateful to our families and friends who supported us throughout the whole study year.

Definitions

Corporate Branding

The combination of marketing efforts that a company undertakes to make a controlled re-presentation of its values and identity (Balmer, 2001).

Corporate Rebranding

“The practice of building anew a name representative of a differentiated position in the mindset of stakeholders and a distinctive identity from competitors” (Muzellec, Doogan & Lambkin, 2003, p. 32).

Employee Branding

“The process by which employees internalize the desired brand image and are motivated to project the image to customers and other organizational constituents” (Miles & Mangold, 2004, p. 68).

Employee Resistance

Employees` resistance to changes inside or outside a company (Strebel, 1996).

Internal Communication

“The communications transactions between individuals and/or groups at various levels and in different areas of specialisation that are intended to design and redesign organisations, to implement designs, and to co-ordinate day-to-day activities” (cited in Welch & Jackson, 2007, p. 179).

Internal Marketing

“Any form of marketing within organization which focuses staff attention on the internal activities that need to be changed in order to enhance external market place performance” (Ballantyne, Christopher & Payne, 1995, p. 15).

Psychological Contract

“The individual beliefs, shaped by the organization, regarding terms of an exchange agree-ment between individuals and their organization” (Rousseau, 1995, p. 9).

Service Branding

“The promise of the bundle of attributes that someone buys…the attributes that make up a brand may be real or illusory, rational or emotional, tangible or invisible” (Ambler & Styles, 1996, p. 10).

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Table of Contents

1 Introduction ............................................................................ 1 1.1 Background ..................................................................................... 1

1.2 Problem Discussion .......................................................................... 2

1.3 Purpose ........................................................................................... 3

1.4 Delimitations ................................................................................... 3

1.5 Disposition ...................................................................................... 4

1.5.1 Introduction .......................................................................... 4

1.5.2 Frame of Reference ................................................................ 4

1.5.3 Methodology ......................................................................... 4

1.5.4 Case findings ......................................................................... 4

1.5.5 Discussion ............................................................................ 4

1.5.6 Conclusions........................................................................... 4

2 Frame of Reference .................................................................. 5 2.1 Corporate Branding .......................................................................... 5

2.1.1 Corporate Branding Framework ............................................... 6

2.2 Service Branding ............................................................................... 7

2.3 Corporate Rebranding ....................................................................... 8

2.3.1 Corporate Rebranding Framework .......................................... 10

2.4 Internal Marketing .......................................................................... 11

2.5 Internal Employee Branding ............................................................. 12

2.5.1 Employee Branding Process .................................................. 12

2.6 Employee Resistance ....................................................................... 15

2.7 Internal Communication .................................................................. 15

2.8 Conceptual Framework of Employee Rebranding Process .................... 17

3 Methodology ......................................................................... 20 3.1 Research purpose ............................................................................ 20

3.2 Research Strategy ............................................................................ 20

3.3 Research Method ............................................................................ 21

3.4 Data Collection .............................................................................. 21

3.4.1 Secondary Data .................................................................... 22

3.4.2 Primary Data ....................................................................... 22

3.4.3 Sampling Method ................................................................. 22

3.4.4 Interviews ........................................................................... 23

3.4.5 Questionnaires ..................................................................... 23

3.5 Data Analysis ................................................................................. 24

3.5.1 Analysis of the Qualitative Data ............................................. 24

3.5.2 Analysis of the Quantitative Data ........................................... 25

3.6 Credibility ...................................................................................... 26

3.6.1 Reliability ............................................................................ 26

3.6.2 Validity ............................................................................... 26

4 Case Findings ........................................................................ 28 4.1 Qualitative Data Results .................................................................. 28

4.1.1 Background ......................................................................... 28

4.1.2 The New Brand ................................................................... 28

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4.1.3 The Rebranding of Vivacom .................................................. 30

4.1.4 Vivacom`s Internal Rebranding .............................................. 30

4.2 Quantitative Data Results ................................................................. 32

4.2.1 Reliability ............................................................................ 32

4.2.2 Respondents ........................................................................ 34

4.2.3 Descriptive Statistics ............................................................. 35

4.2.4 Hypotheses Testing .............................................................. 42

5 Discussion ............................................................................ 44 5.1 New Brand Decision ....................................................................... 44

5.2 Corporate Branding ........................................................................ 45

5.2.1 Vision ................................................................................. 46

5.2.2 Image ................................................................................. 46

5.2.3 Corporate Values ................................................................. 47

5.3 Internal Communication Strategy ...................................................... 47

5.4 Sources of Messages and Messages from Employee`s Perspective .......... 49

5.5 Psychological Contract .................................................................... 50

5.6 Employee Brand Image ................................................................... 51

5.7 Employee Resistance ....................................................................... 51

6 Conclusion ............................................................................ 53 6.1 Limitations .................................................................................... 54

6.2 Future research ............................................................................... 54

List of references ......................................................................... 56

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Appendix Appendix 1- Industry Spread of Rebranded Companies......................................... 61

Appendix 2 – Descriptive Statistics .................................................................... 62

Appendix 3 – Test for Normality ....................................................................... 63

Appendix 4 – Scatterplots ................................................................................. 64

Appendix 5 – Spearman`s Rank Order Correlation ............................................... 65

Appendix 6 – Interview with Adriyana Mihaylova ................................................. 66

Appendix 7 – Interview with Simona Tcharakchieva ............................................. 69

Appendix 8 – Questionnaire .............................................................................. 71

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1 Introduction

In this chapter the background of the research topic about internal rebranding will be presented. After that the identified problem in the topic, followed by the purpose and the research questions of the thesis will be discussed. The delimitations to the topic and the disposition of the paper will be presented at the end of the chapter.

1.1 Background

A brand is traditionally presented in the literature in the field of marketing as “a name, term, sign, symbol, or design, or a combination of them, intended to identify the goods or services of one seller or group of sellers and to differentiate them from those of competi-tors”(cited in Chernatony & Riley, 1998). This definition, introduced firstly by the Ameri-can Marketing Association in 1960 has been adopted by many specialists in the field such as Aaker and Kotler (Chernatony & Riley, 1998). However, brands and brand management have evolved gradually during the years, exceeding the traditional perceptions and claims of consumer-goods marketers (Kotler & Pfoetsch, 2007).

The importance of brands for the companies in every industry has significantly grown (Kotler & Pfoetsch, 2007) and it turns them into one of the most valuable assets for the firms (Kaikati & Kaikati, 2003). Therefore, the building of a strong brand, has started to be closely related to the economic and strategic values that it brings to the company`s brand image (Kaikati & Kaikati, 2003).

According to Coleman, Chernatony and Christodoulides (2011), a special integration be-tween marketing and human resources has to be made in order to build a strong brand, es-pecially when the company works in the service sector. This special collaboration has to be expressed in the way HR department communicates and tries to integrate the service brand identity when recruiting people and when training employees (Coleman et al., 2011).

One of the outcomes of a research conducted in 2005, clearly shows the power of brand-ing. The research involved 23 out of 30 major German companies, trading on the Frank-furt Stock Exchange, and the basic measurement executed in the research was a compari-son of their financial market performance. As a result from the research, it turned out that companies with strong brands performed much better than those with weaker brands. The strong branded companies recuperated faster from the fall-off on the stock market after the terrorist attack on 11th of September 2001 than the companies with weaker brands (Kotler & Pfoetsch, 2007).

However, constructing the brand successfully does not assure the stable development of the company`s brand in the future, due to the dynamic current market. Companies need to revise and relook their brands in order to keep abreast with trends of the modern world. As Merrilees (2005) notes brand evolution is one of the important components for a success-ful strategy. Rebranding is part of this evolution. Many reasons for rebranding have been identified by the researchers. They claim that rebranding should take place if a change in the business mix has occurred – such changes are changing consumer needs, globalization, mergers and acquisitions, etc. (Goi & Goi, 2011).

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A valuable example is the rebranding of France Telecom after acquiring Orange in 2000. The strength of the Orange brand affected the image and future performance of France Telecom (Ridgeon, 2007) so positively that in 2004 the company was announced as a num-ber one mobile operator and internet provider in France and number two mobile operator in Europe (Melewar, Hussey & Srivoravilai, 2005).

Nevertheless, the effects of a rebranding process may be questionable. Several studies have been conducted to investigate the effects of rebranding on brand equity (Muzellec & Lambkin, 2006). It is stated that rebranding is costly, time-consuming (Causon, 2004) and some problems arise such as loss of consumer loyalty, loss of market share and loss of choices (Kapferer, 2004). Moreover, as the corporate rebranding practices increase in number, the failure rate of corporate rebranding is stated to be high compared to success rate (Stuart & Muzellec, 2004).

An example of failed rebranding efforts is the transformation of the UK Post Office to Consignia during 2001. The cost of the unsuccessful rebranding process to the Post office was 2 million pounds and additionally 1 million pounds for the replacement with its old name Royal Mail (Muzellec & Lambkin, 2006).

1.2 Problem Discussion

Stuart and Muzellec (2004) note that the term “rebranding” in the current business litera-ture means and is used as “a brand being reborn” and they view corporate rebranding as the changes in the company`s name, logo or slogan. The fact that rebranding can occur on three levels in an organization – corporate level, strategic business unit level and product level, should also be mentioned (Lambkin & Muzellec, 2008). Rebranding is defined as “the practice of building anew a name representative of a differentiated position in the mindset of stakeholders and a distinctive identity from competitors” (Muzellec, Doogan & Lamb-kin, 2003, p. 32).

However, the employees always influence the outcomes of a rebranding, no matter on which level it is executed. This is due to the fact that employees are the ones who interact most intensively with customers, especially in the service sectors, and thus they affect and form the image that these customers have of the brand (de Chernatony, 1999; Ind, 2003). Moreover the negative effects on the staff will transfer to the customers, because the beha-vior and even the appearance of the employees signal that something has changed in the company. Therefore, it is crucial for the management to properly communicate to its em-ployees the changes in the company.

Studies have been made on rebranding of companies in different industries. Some re-searches focus on the service sector in particular. Most of them investigate rebranding in companies from the banking and telecommunications industries. According to research which included 166 companies, representing more than 40 industries, the information technology and telecommunications industry is the largest category of rebranded compa-nies with its 22.3% (Muzellec, Doogan & Lambkin, 2003). The industries were compressed into 12 different industry types. Appendix 1 presents the results of this study.

The authors suggest that the reason for this result is the advancement of technologies and the large number of mergers and acquisitions that have taken place in the IT and telecom-munications industries in recent years. Researchers have studied several cases of rebranded telecommunications companies such as France Telecom, Eircom, Vodafone Ireland, etc.

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Eircom and Vodafone Ireland have been used as success cases in the studies of Muzellec and Lambkin (2006) and Daly and Moloney (2004).

Rebranding in the services and especially in the telecommunications industry is a recent trend that needs to be further explored. As the workforce in the service sector represents the “product” of a service (Richey, 2002), the employees need special attention when changing a brand. The marketing management needs to focus on employees` attitudes, per-ceptions and views in order to direct them to the desired brand image. In rebranding a ser-vice company, the communication strategy and the whole process are of great importance. This raises the problem as how employees perceive these rebranding efforts.

1.3 Purpose

The rebranding process in service companies from employee`s perspective can be regarded as insufficiently investigated in the literature. The way rebranding is executed and commu-nicated in this type of companies is strongly related to the employees who take part in creating the image of the brand and who represent the direct connection with the ultimate customer. Since a significant part of the rebranded firms worldwide belongs to the tele-communication industry, the authors have decided to look in depth in the rebranding process of the largest Bulgarian Telecommunications company Vivacom. In this study the authors are going to focus on how rebranding is executed and communicated internally to the employees of the company, aiming as a result to answer the following research ques-tions:

What decisions does the management make about rebranding?

Which are the components of the internal communication strategy used by manage-ment in the rebranding process?

How do the employees evaluate the internal communication regarding the rebranding which the management uses?

To what extent the desired image is perceived by the employees?

Is there a correlation between the employees` perceived image and their evaluation of the channels, messages and changes in the rebranding process?

The way the management tries to reach its employees in the rebranding process plays a ma-jor role in the successful brand transformation. Therefore it is interesting to find out how the employees evaluate the communication strategy that the management implements and how they perceive the new image of the company. In order to get insight to the internal re-branding process the correlation between the perceived image by the employees and the components of the internal communication strategy will be presented.

1.4 Delimitations

This thesis will focus on the process of rebranding related to the internal branding of the employees in the specified company. The research of the rebranding process will be from managerial and employees` point of view, thus concentrating on internal communication rather than external activities. Moreover, the research will be undertaken for one particular company in one specific industry, which will limit the generalizations from the analysis. Another issue will be the time distance from the rebranding campaign as Vivacom re-branded in 2009. The views and opinions of the employees may have faded way, since the rebranding, which is why the results from the investigation may not be the closest to reali-ty. Nevertheless, the effects of the rebranding campaign are expected to be noticeable, as rebranding is a slow process and its implementation takes a lot of time.

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1.5 Disposition

The outline of this thesis will go as follows:

1.5.1 Introduction

The topic of the thesis is presented in this chapter. The area of interest is discussed and the research questions are defined. At the end of the chapter the delimitations of the thesis are presented and finally the disposition is explained.

1.5.2 Frame of Reference

The literature review will be presented in this chapter by focusing on the relevant theories and models for the purpose of the research. The frameworks that will be used as a basis for the research and analysis will be also discussed.

1.5.3 Methodology

The methodological reasoning of the research is presented in this chapter. The approaches, methods and techniques that have been chosen and used during the research will be ex-plained, as well.

1.5.4 Case findings

In this chapter are described the key findings from the interviews and the documentation provided by the investigated company, followed by the corresponding questionnaire re-sults.

1.5.5 Discussion

Analysis of the qualitative and quantitative data will be provided in order to answer the re-search questions of this thesis by following the conceptual framework of the employee re-branding process, described in Chapter 2.

1.5.6 Conclusions

In this chapter the outcomes of the conducted research in the thesis will be comprised. Moreover, the shortcomings of the paper will be highlighted and the suggestions for future research presented.

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2 Frame of Reference

In this chapter a review of the literature will be made by highlighting the important and relevant theories and models. Firstly, the authors will discuss the theories related to corporate branding and the elements and components which are included in the literature. The goal is to see how a company brands itself initially and which the important issues that need to be considered when a company rebrands itself. Then, the concept of rebranding will be presented together with the corporate rebranding framework in order to describe the es-sence of rebranding and the rebranding process in general. To narrow down the topic, branding in the service sector will be briefly discussed, since the company being investigated is in the telecommunication sector. Final-ly, theory regarding internal marketing, employee branding, employee resistance and internal communication within a company will be presented in order to follow the role of the employees in the rebranding process and to emphasize the importance of communication strategies inside a company.

2.1 Corporate Branding

The concept of product branding historically involves the view that the brand`s role is to differentiate a product or service in customers` minds (Knox & Bickerton, 2003). Kapferer (1997) defines a brand as a symbol which distinguishes the products and services of one company from the products and services of another company. Product branding nowadays is characterized by layers around the core functionality of a product or service. These layers add value to the product or service and make it distinctive in the market (Knox & Bicker-ton, 2003).

Similarly, a corporate brand`s objective is to create differentiation and preference (Knox & Bickerton, 2003). The main difference is that in corporate branding these activities are ma-naged at the organization`s level and not at the product`s or service`s level. The impor-tance of the organization and its role as a strategic element in the process of branding has been a focus for discussion in the branding literature (Knox & Bickerton, 2003).

Corporate branding is described by de Chernatony (1997) as a strategy involving the same name for the company and the brand. A corporate brand can be defined as the combina-tion of marketing efforts that a company undertakes to make a controlled representation of its values and identity (Balmer, 2001). Hatch and Schultz (2003) discuss corporate branding by trying to distinguish it from product branding. As they state, in the highly competitive environment, companies need to differentiate themselves by positioning the whole organi-zation and not only its products or services. This will mean that the organization itself will be in the center of marketing and the values and emotions that it stands for will be the key elements for differentiation. A strong corporate brand is claimed to be of great importance when creating positive perceptions and attitudes towards existing or new products of the company (Brown & Dacin, 1997). Furthermore, studies discuss the important role of em-ployees in the corporate branding process as they build the relationships with the stake-holders and are involved in building the meaning of the brand (Hatch & Schultz, 2003). The stakeholders of an organization include customers, suppliers, employees, investors, lo-cal communities, regulators and other partners of the company (Harrison & Freeman, 1999; Hatch & Schultz, 2003). Another issue brought up by Hatch and Schultz (2003) is the fact that by branding a company, the organizational behavior becomes more visible and transparent which increases the importance of a good corporate culture.

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Differentiation is not the only thing that corporate branding is about. It is also about be-longing (Hatch & Schultz, 2003). Stakeholders will feel that they are part of this set of val-ues and emotions that the organization is symbolizing if the branding works as it is in-tended. The strong corporate brand attracts the key stakeholders, gives them a sense of be-longing and keeps them active by helping them experience and express their values (Hatch & Schultz, 2003).

The main differences between corporate and product branding are the following (Hatch & Schultz, 2003):

Corporate branding creates transparency in terms of corporate actions

Decisions are made on higher executive level

Targets not only customers, but also other stakeholders of a company

Management of a corporate brand involves all departments of a corporation, not only the marketing department

Corporate brands are long-term and more strategic

2.1.1 Corporate Branding Framework

Hatch & Schultz (2003) propose a framework (see Figure 2.1) for understanding corporate branding, which was further discussed and developed by Knox and Bickerton (2003). The framework has three key components which are linked together - strategic vision, corporate images and organizational culture. They need to be consistent and coherent in order to build a strong and credible corporate brand. These three elements will be discussed briefly in the next paragraphs as explained by Hatch & Schultz (2003).

Figure 2.1 Framework of Corporate Branding (Hatch & Schultz, 2003).

2.1.1.1 Strategic Vision

Strategic vision has been defined as “a coherent and powerful statement of what the busi-ness can and should be (ten) years hence” by Wilson (1992, p. 18). He states that vision is needed if companies want to reduce the uncertainties related to the market in the long run. Vision gives direction and a destination for a company which strives for success.

Hatch and Schultz (2003) define strategic vision as the main idea that the management of a company strives for as achievements in the future. As Collins and Porras (1994) also de-scribe it, it is what the organization wants to be in the future. However, Hatch and Schultz (2003) state that even if a company wants to follow new goals it will need to relate them to the heritage of the company, otherwise drastic changes may mean losing credibility. An in-teresting note made by them is that instead of using stakeholders` image for a company to

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compare it to organizational vision, this image can be used in the process of developing the strategic vision.

2.1.1.2 Organizational Culture

Hatch and Schultz (2003) define organizational culture as the values, beliefs and basic as-sumptions embodying the heritage of a company. Culture is communicated to the compa-ny`s members which represent the organization afterwards. As these authors also claim, the organizational culture could be a competitive advantage for a company if the values ex-pressed by the corporate brand are in accordance with its culture and core values. Organi-zational culture is reflected on the organizational behavior. Therefore, credible brand values will help to create correspondence between what the brand promises and what the organi-zation delivers (Hatch & Schultz, 2003).

2.1.1.3 Corporate Image

Hatch and Schultz (2003) talk about organizational image mainly in the model of corporate branding. Corporate images as defined by Hatch and Schultz (2003) are the views that stakeholders have of a company and the way the world sees it. Corporate brands affect not only the images that consumers have of it, but also have impact on the images held by the stakeholders of organizations (Hatch & Schultz, 2003). The image of a company enhances its attractiveness and reputation if managed in consistence with the vision and culture, be-cause it indicates more clearly who the company is and what it stands for (Hatch & Schultz, 2003). The image is also related to the communicated to the stakeholders’ distinctiveness, as well as their perceptions of the company. The objective of images is to generate brand equity by influencing the stakeholders’ behavior (Hatch & Schultz, 2003). Furthermore, the image and the culture form the brand promises related to the brand experience that the company offers (Hatch & Schultz, 2003). The authors further explain that before commu-nicating externally, the companies “talk to themselves” in order to confirm the self-image. Sometimes the external images, which are the actual images that the stakeholders hold, may differ from the images that the company holds internally, which are the desired images. When the company understands and acknowledges this difference, it will be able to work for narrowing this gap (Hatch & Schultz, 2003).

2.2 Service Branding

McDonald, de Chernatony, & Harris (2001, p. 340) define services as “an activity which has some element of intangibility associated with it”. They also add that services involve some interaction with the customers or property in customers` possession, which does not end with transfer of ownership. Moreover, a change of condition may occur and services may not be associated with a physical product (McDonald et al., 2001). Services also are characterized with intangibility, inseparability of production and consumption, heterogenei-ty and perishability (Shostack, 1977; Edgett & Parkinson, 1993). If services are managed properly and sustained successfully, they can be considered a competitive advantage be-cause they will be more difficult to copy (Doyle, 1989). However, services depend on the organizational culture and the employees, which make it difficult to create successfully ser-vices.

The most appropriate definition for service brand, as de Chernatony and Segal-Horn (2003) claim, is the one proposed by Ambler and Styles (1996, p.10) – “the promise of the bundle of attributes that someone buys…the attributes that make up a brand may be real or illusory, rational or emotional, tangible or invisible”. This definition includes two of the characteristics of services – intangibility and heterogeneity, and depicts service brands as a

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set of functional and emotional values (de Chernatony & Segal-Horn, 2003). The focus on the service process involves finding employees that have similar values to the organization-al culture and employees that would behave according to the brand promise. An organiza-tional culture which emphasizes the importance of the interaction and relationship with the customer may help in creating a strong service brand.

2.3 Corporate Rebranding

Muzellec et al. (2003, p. 32) define rebranding as “the practice of building anew a name representative of a differentiated position in the mindset of stakeholders and a distinctive identity from competitors”. It is also described as a change in the identity of an organiza-tion or an attempt to change the stakeholders` perceptions of the company (Muzellec & Lambkin, 2006). In other words, rebranding is more or less some kind of change and it may be a long process. Rebranding can occur on several levels. There may be rebranding on corporate level, strategic business unit level or product level (Lambkin & Muzellec, 2008).

According to Daly and Moloney (2004), rebranding involves changing both tangible and in-tangible elements of a brand. Therefore, corporate rebranding can be seen as a continuum from minor changes to complete renaming. However, rebranding should also lead to an ac-tual change in the organization as well (Hankinson & Lomax, 2006). As McGurk (1997) suggests, rebranding may involve changing of the image of the company.

The results of a rebranding may be doubtful because as Kapferer (2004) notes a rebranding may lead to loss of choices, loyal customers and market share. With the branding process a company builds its vision, culture and image, which also helps to create the equity of the brand. Name awareness is also related to brand equity. Therefore, change in the name will mean nullifying of all the branding efforts undertaken by the company during the years and may damage the existing brand equity (Muzellec & Lambkin, 2006).

The motives and reasons for rebranding are various and they can be not only negative (e.g. bad reputation), but also positive (e.g. acquisition of the company). Rebranding may occur when the company feels that the brand needs refreshing or updating if it is outdated. As Duncan notes, rebranding should take place only if there is some kind of change in the business mix dictating a need for evolving the brand. It is also important for the company to really say something new to the stakeholders and to communicate it properly, otherwise the rebranding process may turn out to be not so effective (Stuart & Muzellec, 2004). Goi and Goi (2001) summarize the different reasons for rebranding and divide them into exter-nal and internal drivers (see Table 2.1).

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Table 2.1 Summary of rebranding drivers (Goi & Goi, 2001).

Stuart and Muzellec (2004) claim that in the literature rebranding means that a brand is be-ing reborn. However, it is true when the rebranding process involves a change only in the name of the company. Stuart and Muzellec (2004) argue that corporate rebranding involves not only a change in the name, but also in the logo or slogan. They further divide the type of changes into revolutionary and evolutionary. The revolutionary change includes chang-ing of the three elements – name, logo and slogan, whereas evolutionary change includes only the slogan or the logo. Corporate rebranding can take place in several ways:

Change of name and logo

Change of name, logo and slogan

Change of logo only

Change of logo and slogan

Change of slogan only

A change in the name only is not mentioned, because such a drastic change will always in-volve change in the other two elements also. As a company`s name is the primary means for communication to the stakeholders, a change of it may be quite risky as what is being communicated will change dramatically (Stuart & Muzellec, 2004). Changes in the logo and

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slogan are also important elements in the branding and rebranding processes. Logo relates to the company through its shape and colors, and a change in a logo without any obvious reasons will be either unnoticed or looked at with suspicion. Change in the slogan, on the other hand, has a lower risk than changes in the name or logo. However, they are also im-portant as a slogan change will mean change in the positioning of the company (Stuart & Muzellec, 2004).

2.3.1 Corporate Rebranding Framework

Daly and Molony (2004) propose a corporate rebranding framework (see Figure 2.2) based on their research with the management, the personnel and the customers of companies that rebranded themselves. The framework includes three main stages – analysis, planning and evaluation. The key elements of the framework are situation analysis, the renaming strategy, communication and training strategies and the rebranding marketing plan.

Figure 2.2 Corporate rebranding framework (Daly & Moloney, 2004).

The first step in the rebranding process is analyzing the market, the customers` prefe-rences, the competitors and the management`s and employees` attitudes. Brand audit is al-so important in this stage. Afterwards, the new brand decision is made, which is formed as a result from the identification of the brand elements that need to be maintained perma-nently and those brand elements that need to be retained only temporarily. After their iden-tification the company can distinguish brand elements that have to be removed in the process of rebranding. The next step of the rebranding process is making communication

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strategies for targeting the external and internal customers. After analyzing the attitudes of the employees the company will need to develop training programs and communication strategies for the internal customer. In this way the employees will support the process of rebranding, will be more committed to it and will be trained in the acquiring company`s policies and procedures (Daly & Moloney, 2004). The communication strategy for the ex-ternal customers involves developing of renaming strategy and rebranding marketing plan. The last step in the rebranding process is the evaluation of the previous stages and cam-paigns in terms of the goals and objectives that have been set in the process.

Corporate rebranding needs to be carefully considered by the management of a company and if they decide to rebrand they will need to sustain the level of consistency and continui-ty while doing so. As with corporate branding, the employees should also be involved in the process of corporate rebranding (Muzellec & Lambkin, 2006).

2.4 Internal Marketing

The idea to consider employees as internal customers, used in the corporate rebranding framework of Daly and Moloney (2004) and already illustrated in Figure 2.2.is stated to be derived from internal marketing literature. In fact the important role of employees in ser-vice organizations is broadly discussed not only in the concept of internal marketing but in the concepts of relationship marketing and service branding as well. The recognition of employees` role in service marketing led to further focus and development of the concept of internal marketing (Tansuhaj, Randall & McCullough, 1988).

George (1990) defines internal marketing as a “strategic weapon” for providing high-quality service and a high-level of customer satisfaction in an organization. Moreover he investi-gates the positive impact that organizational behavior can have on the successful imple-mentation of internal marketing program (George, 1990). However Ballantyne, Christopher and Payne (1995) describe the internal marketing as “any form of marketing within the or-ganization which focuses staff attention on the internal activities that need to be changed in order to enhance external market place performance” (Ballantyne et al., 1995, p. 15). As a result of numerous researches in the field of internal marketing, different description of the employees and their role in marketing activities can be met in the literature. Several of them will be further discussed.

Gummesson (1987) explains that all the employees except those working in the marketing department in the organization are in fact part-time marketers because they execute the di-rect contact with the ultimate customer. Their skills and level of customer orientation influ-ence the perception of the customer towards the quality of services, provided by the com-pany as a whole (Gummesson, 1987). Therefore part-time marketers have to be motivated and well trained in order to be aware of their marketing tasks and accordingly to be able to accomplish them (Grönroos, 1994). The other vision about the role employees’ play in a company already mentioned in the paper emphasizes that the employees have to be treated as internal customers and their job as the internal product in the context of internal market-ing (Berry, 1981). The extent to which a service company succeeds to attract, motivate and keeps high- quality working force lead to providing of better services to the external cus-tomers (Berry, 2002). The approach of looking at the internal marketing as a starting point for developing the external marketing strategy has been adopted by many researchers in the field (George, 1990; Grönroos, 1994; Berry, 1981; Piercy & Morgan, 1991).

Furthermore Piercy and Morgan (1991) suggest that along with the external marketing pro-gram an internal one has to be also developed in the organization in order to implement

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successfully the company`s marketing strategy on the external and internal market. In their research they adopt the idea about the role of employees in the organization as customers and introduce the concept to use the same elements of the external marketing program but in internal market context. Thus the elements, presented by Piercy and Morgan (1991), in-clude product, price, communication and distribution. The product in the internal market-ing program refers to the values, attitudes and behavior that the employees (customers) have to acquire whereas the price expresses the psychological cost they pay in order to adopt company`s culture. Moreover the level of directness (e.g. face-to-face interaction, written reports etc.) and the tools (meetings, committees, training sessions) used for com-municating different marketing messages to the employees indicate the communication and distribution of the internal marketing program (Piercy & Morgan, 1991).

2.5 Internal Employee Branding

The concepts of internal marketing and service branding are used by companies for defin-ing their marketing strategy and the way they decide to approach the customer. The build-ing of the company`s brand can be identified as a part of the implementation of the com-pany`s strategy and it is stated to be strongly influenced by the employees` work (Miles & Mangold, 2004). Therefore the employee branding is an important process that has to be taken into account especially when changes occur in the companies, providing services, which is the case with the rebranding process. Miles and Mangold (2004) describe em-ployee branding as “the process by which employees internalize the desired brand image and are motivated to project the image to customers and other organizational constitu-ents”. Moreover it is emphasized that the successful employee branding depends not only on how the organization tries to project the desired image in the minds of employees but also on how quickly it succeeds to transfer it in the employee`s minds. The speed of the projection of the image matters because the employees have to perceive the right image be-fore carrying it over to the customers and other stakeholders (Miles & Mangold, 2004). Furthermore King and Grace (2008) suggest that employee branding serves as a glue for shaping the employee`s behavior in accordance to the desired image and in order to achieve consistency in service experience and satisfaction of customer`s expectations.

2.5.1 Employee Branding Process

Many researchers indicate the importance of employee branding and its positive outcomes to the company`s survival and competitiveness but an explanation of how it has to be inte-grated in the marketing of the company seems to be under conceptualized (Miles & Man-gold, 2004). However Miles and Mangold (2004) propose a model of how the process of employee branding takes place in the organization, including all the factors and steps that have to be taken in consideration by customer oriented companies (See Figure 2.3).

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Figure 2.3 Employee Branding Process (Miles & Mangold, 2004).

The relationship between the organization and its employees play a vital role for the proper functioning of any company and especially in employee branding. The organization has to gain deeper knowledge about the structure of this relationship and to understand it com-pletely in order to communicate the desired image to its employees (Miles & Mangold, 2004). The model, suggested by Miles and Mangold (2004) explains this relationship by suggesting several stages or perspectives that have to be considered in order to understand the interaction between the organization and its employees. These stages comprise the source of messages in this interaction, the employee`s perceptions in the context of psy-chological contact, the resulting interpretation of the employee brand image and the conse-quence and outcomes from the employee branding process (Miles & Mangold, 2004).

2.5.1.1 Source of Messages

The projection of the values and expectations of the organization towards its employees is executed by messages, communicated by different internal formal and informal communi-cation channels as well as different external formal and informal sources. As the organiza-tion may not have the influence in all the sources of information, it is really important for it at least to be aware of the possible paths of messages that can affect the successful adop-tion of the organizational values by the employees. The messages communicated and con-trolled by the organization are required to be characterized with clarity and consistency (Green, Walls & Schrest, 1994).

The information transferred by the human resource management such as recruitment doc-uments, company`s website, newspapers, training and development are stated to form the first impressions of the employees about the company and to establish the employee`s first expectations about the job content. These messages consist of information about what are the company`s values and goals and what is the required employee behavior in the organi-zation. The essence of it can be reinforced from the management system in terms of what is the importance of the link between performance and rewards. In addition it can also be strengthened from the public relations department of the company by sending external messages that are consistent with the internal ones in order to avoid employee`s confusion and loss of trust towards the company (Miles & Mangold, 2004).

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Moreover the coworker influence on the employee`s perception of the desired image, as well as the influence of the organizational culture must not be underestimated by the or-ganization. They can impact the right understanding of the message and can lead to adopt-ing an image, different from the desired one. Advertising messages and campaigns are indi-cated to be also a serious external source of information that influences the employee branding process. The organization has to be careful in formulating the advertising mes-sages and keep them addressed not only to customers but to the employees as well, in or-der to avoid inconsistency in the shared information in and out of the company. In addi-tion the customer feedback and word-of-mouth communication can be distinguished as in-formal external sources of information for employees and are characterized with powerful impact on the employee`s perceptions of organizational image (Miles & Mangold, 2004).

2.5.1.2 Psychological Contract

The next step differentiated in the model of employee branding process is related to the principles of the concept of psychological contract (Miles & Mangold, 2004). According to Rousseau (1995) the psychological contract refers to “the individual beliefs, shaped by the organization, regarding terms of an exchange agreement between individuals and their or-ganization” (Rousseau, 1995, p. 9). It expresses the employee`s perception about how the company has agreed to treat her/him in the organization in exchange of adoption of a cer-tain behavior such as work performance, pursuit of the organizational goals and learning of organizational culture. Thus the employee can expect from the organization to be fairly re-warded according to their efforts to adjust to the company`s requirements, giving them the opportunity to grow in the organization, for instance. Any kind of unexpected change in the organization can be perceived as a violation of this psychological agreement between the parties. It can lead to negative outcomes such as decreased loyalty towards the organi-zation, reduced employee`s productivity and negative word-of-mouth. Therefore it is cru-cial for the company to try to meet the employee`s expectation in communicating clear and consistent messages through all the channels (Rousseau, 1995).

2.5.1.3 Employee Brand Image

The successful projection of the desired image depends on the extent to which the message of the organization is successfully communicated to the employees and the psychological contract has been fairly established between the parties. After the adoption of the brand the employees are ready to project with the same success the brand image into the custom-er`s perceptions. However the motivation of the employees is stated to affect the develop-ment of the employee brand image. Moreover, if the brand promises are perceived by the employees as broken, they will also start questioning the ability of the organization to fulfill the brand promises towards the customers (Miles & Mangold, 2004).

2.5.1.4 Consequences

The consequences from a successful development of the employee brand can result not only in increased employee performance and satisfaction, but it can also lead to customer and employee retention and decreased employee turnover. However negative consequences can occur if the projection of the desired brand image is not transferred adequately to the employee and if the psychological contract is perceived to be violated by the organization. These negative outcomes can comprise negative word-of-mouth communication, de-creased result performance, lost employee and customer loyalty (Miles & Mangold, 2004).

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2.6 Employee Resistance

As already explained, corporate rebranding involves changes in different aspects. As Arme-nakis, Harris and Mossholder (1993) note, the companies rely increasingly on their em-ployees to adapt to different changes in the environment inside or outside the company. However, the employees often resist changes (Strebel, 1996). Employee resistance is an important issue that has to be taken into account when a company undertakes an organiza-tional change of any kind. It can turn into an important barrier against innovation into the company and can affect negatively the competitiveness of the company as well as the out-comes from the innovation itself. One reason for this reaction is the fact that the em-ployees usually associate the organizational change or any innovation with lay-offs, skill ob-solescence and personnel reshuffles (Zwick, 2002). Moreover Zwick (2002) claims that the level of employee resistance depends on the reason behind the organizational change. If the decision for implementation of new innovation in the organization is related to some negative aspect of the business development of the company, the likelihood of internal re-sistance increases (Zwick, 2002). In addition Zwick (2002) argues that the resistance in lower educated workers in the organization is expected to be higher than the resistance of higher educated employees because of the increased flexibility and the ability to adapt to the latter.

However another approach for investigating the reasons for employee resistance and its consequences is suggested by Oreg (2006). The employee resistance is explained through investigation of tridimensional attitude of the employee towards change, consisting of af-fective, behavioral and cognitive components (Oreg, 2006). The affective component re-flects employee`s feelings about the change such as anger or anxiety whereas the cognitive component refers to the employee`s thoughts whether the change is really needed and beneficial for the organization or not. Moreover the last (behavior) component conveys how the employee intents to react to the change i.e. whether she/he decides to encourage the change or she/he dislikes the change and tries to sabotage it. Although each compo-nent underlines a different aspect from the phenomenon of employee resistance, they sometimes can be perceived as one and the same thing (Oreg, 2006).

After understanding better the nature of the employee resistance a special management ap-proach is needed to be used for preventing the resistance. One of the more broadly sug-gested in the literature way to manage the employee resistance is to involve employees in the process of change (Cox & Makin, 1994; Waddell & Sohal, 1998; Kotter & Schlesinger, 2008). Their involvement in the learning, planning and implementation stages of the change process can lead to decreased employee resistance. Moreover it is suggested that if the management assures the two- way communication, consultation and information shar-ing in the organization, the employees will become more committed to the occurring changes (Waddell & Sohal, 1998).

2.7 Internal Communication

Frank and Brownell (1989) define the internal communication as “the communications transactions between individuals and/or groups at various levels and in different areas of specialization that are intended to design and redesign organizations, to implement designs, and to co-ordinate day-to-day activities” (cited in Welch & Jackson, 2007, p. 179). Internal communication plays an important role in the process of establishing the strategy, culture, values and personality of the organization and it can strongly affect the company`s sustai-nability and competitiveness (Dunmore, 2002). The need for efficient internal communica-tion of the organizational change is stated to be broadly discussed by many researchers in

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the field (Nelson & Coxhead, 1997; Daly, Teague & Kitchen, 2003; Proctor & Doukakis, 2003). They all emphasize that the integration of the internal communication in the exter-nal one is essential for the successful communication strategy and for the survival of the organization (Nelson & Coxhead, 1997; Daly et al., 2003; Proctor & Doukakis, 2003). Re-gardless of the type of the occurring change in the organization, the internal communica-tion in the company represents a powerful tool for managing the different arising sources of resistance to the changes (Proctor & Doukakis, 2003), such as, for instance, the em-ployee resistance appears to be. Moreover the results from studies have shown that the poor internal communication in the organization is sometimes the principle reason for the failure of organizational change program (Murdoch, 1997).

Furthermore in order to implement successfully the internal communication strategy in the process of change in the organization several best practiced models can be identified. One of these models is presented by Quirke (2008) where seven area or links for consideration are distinguished (see Figure 2.4) including the following activities: identifying the required for employees attitudes and behavior (strategy area), presenting inspirationally the organiza-tional goals in order to build commitment (leadership area), setting a plan for communicat-ing clear messages to the employee (planning and prioritization area), coordination of the messages in order to avoid overload of information (channel management), engaging pro-fessionals in managing the communication channels (the internal communications func-tions area), explaining face-to-face the information and the reasons behind the organiza-tional change (face-to-face communication area) and establishing standards for assessing the communication effectiveness and functionality (impact measurement area) (Quirke, 2008).

Figure 2.4 Seven links of communication (Quirke, 2008).

Leadership

Planning & prioritization

Channels & content

management

Communication roles

Face-to-face

Impact measurement

Strategy

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Three steps for a successful internal communication are identified in the strategy link of communication. They include the clear identification of the strategy of the organization, the desired by the company employees’ behavior and the use of the communication for helping the employees to achieve this behavior and to understand the strategy. In addition Quirke mention that the communication in a successful company in time of changes is cha-racterized by rapid response and strong established links between the strategy, planning, IT functions and marketing.

Furthermore the next communication link discussed by Quirke (2008) concerns the com-munication of the leaders in the organization. The importance of consistent message, clear organizational purpose and principles and strongly identified focus in the way the leader-ship communicate in the organization is emphasized in this model. In other words these characteristics of the communication have to remain the same no matter of the different leadership style, practiced in the company (Quirke, 2008).

The link, following the leadership communication link in the model of Quirke (2008) is identified to concern the planning and the prioritization in the organization. The company has to not only set clear priorities and plan its internal communication but also it has to re-vise its communication goals and activities periodically in order to be able to manage em-ployees` reaction when a change occurs (Quirke, 2008).

The channel management link for communication indicates that the messages about the changes have to be not only transferred to the employees in the organization but also they have to carry meaning to them. The way the employees have to prioritized the load of in-formation transferred in the process have to be clarified in the message which means that the coordination between the channel have to be assured by the management (Quirke, 2008).

Regarding the internal communication link, it emphasizes that the internal communicators has to be aware of the business strategy and to understand it completely, because only then they will be able to communicate properly the message to the employees of the company (Quirke, 2008).

Moreover the communication in face-to-face link from the model refers to the belief that nothing can replace the result from face-to-face interaction and presentation of informa-tion in the company. Even though this form of communication is time consuming and the internet can provide the needed information the interaction from the face-to-face commu-nication are emphasized to be more effective (Quirke, 2008).

The impact measurement link for consideration in this model illustrates the importance not only of clear identification of goals in the communication program but also a regular evalu-ation of how successful they are achieved. Moreover Quirke (2008) claims that the periodi-cal appraisal of the communication that the management execute in the company, is needed in order to increase the quality of this communication (Quirke, 2008).

2.8 Conceptual Framework of Employee Rebranding Process

As already clarified the purpose of this thesis is to find out what are the decisions that the management makes regarding the rebranding and the internal communication strategies during the rebranding process. Employees` attitudes and understanding of these strategies and the achieved results also are a focus of the thesis. In order to achieve these goals, the authors are going to use four models derived from the theories. As a special framework re-garding the internal rebranding process could not be found in the existing literature on the

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topic, the authors will present an adapted framework (see Figure 2.5), combining the fol-lowing, already mentioned in the paper, models: corporate branding model (Hatch & Shultz, 2003), corporate rebranding framework (Daly & Moloney, 2004), the employee branding model (Miles & Mangold, 2004) and the model of seven links of communication (Quirke, 2008). The framework is developed only for the purpose of this thesis, and based on it will be designed the interviews and the questionnaire. Furthermore, the analysis and discussion of the qualitative and quantitative data will follow the stages of this framework. The reasoning behind the links between these models will be presented by an explanation of each step of the derived framework.

Figure 2.5 Conceptual framework of employee rebranding process.

1. The first step in the elaborated in the paper framework includes the “new brand decision” taken in the company and derived from the corporate rebranding frame-work suggested by Daly & Moloney (2004). The “new brand decision” is related to the components of the new brand after the identification of the ones which have to be removed (Daly & Moloney, 2004). Moreover it serves as a basis for the decisions that the management makes in terms of corporate branding and which are pre-sented as a second step in the conceptual framework.

2. The second step includes the corporate branding model of Hatch & Shultz (2003) which explains the consistency between the corporate vision, culture and image in the company. These three elements from the corporate branding model will be the basis of the messages that the company will send to its employees during the re-branding.

3. Furthermore the “internal communication strategy” is distinguished as a third step in the conceptual framework. This part deals with the strategies that the manage-ment plans in order to project the new values, culture, vision and expectations. It includes a description of the internal communication strategy, presented in the cor-

1. New Brand Decision

2. Corporate branding:

Vision, culture, image

3. Internal communication

strategy

4. Sources of messages and

messages:

Formal internal communication

5 Interpretations:

Psychological contract

6. Perceptions:

Employee brand image

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porate rebranding framework (Daly & Moloney, 2004). Additionally some features from the model of the seven communication links of Quirke (2008) are also pre-sented in this step in order to complement the theory in the section. Furthermore, the next three steps in the conceptual framework are part of the employee branding model, proposed by Miles and Mangold (2004).

4. The fourth step of the conceptual framework includes the “source of messages”, which includes messages and their paths for reaching the employees. This part deals with the “how” when implementing the internal communication strategies. There-fore, it is essential for the messages sent and the channels used to be clear and con-sistent. It should be made clear that in this paper the main focus is on the formal internal communication, as part of the whole strategy.

5. The fifth step is the “perceptions” of the employees and it includes the psychologi-cal contract. It is important step from the internal rebranding as during the re-branding the perceptions of what is expected from the employees may change as a result. Such changes will influence the “interpretations” that the employees make in the next step.

6. The “interpretation” step refers to the success of projecting the desired image. It is the consequence of all other previous steps and depends highly on their consisten-cy. The successfully projected desired images will lead to successfully projected brand images to the customers.

As already mentioned, the presented conceptual framework will serve as a basis for design-ing the interview guidelines and the questionnaires. It will also be used as a guideline for the analytical chapter of this thesis.

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3 Methodology

In this chapter the methodology will be presented. The choice of approaches and methods that are relevant to the research problem will be explained. The techniques used in the research process will also be presented.

3.1 Research purpose

Research purpose is classified in three types of studies. The first one is descriptive study, which according to Robson (2002) aims to depict persons, events or situations. The second one is explanatory study, aiming to explain relationships between variables and establish causal relationships (Saunders, Lewis & Thornhill, 2007).

The third type of research purpose is exploratory study and it is related to exploring and investigating phenomena in a new light (Robson, 2002). Exploratory studies are appropri-ate for understanding the nature of the problem. Its advantage is its flexibility as it allows changing the direction of the research. Such research can be conducted with literature re-view, focus groups or interviews with experts (Saunders et al., 2007).

Rebranding has been largely discussed in the literature in order to reveal the consequences from such action on customer`s perceptions and more specifically on brand equity. How-ever, the role of the employees, especially in the service sector, has not so widely been stu-died. Therefore, this research will be exploratory, as our goal is to understand the nature of internal rebranding and to gain insights in the topic in terms of management practices and internal communication strategies. The employees` perceptions of these practices and communication strategies will also be studied in the context of the telecommunication company Vivacom.

3.2 Research Strategy

The strategy used in this paper is case study. It is defined as a strategy using empirical study of a phenomenon within its real life context (Robson, 2002). In this case the boundaries between the phenomenon and its context are blurred (Yin, 2003). Case studies are appro-priate for in-depth analysis of a phenomenon and when answering “why”, “what” or “how” questions (Morris & Wood, 1991). For this type of research a variety of data collec-tion techniques can be used often in combination. A specific characteristic of case studies is the triangulation of various sources of data in order to make sure that “data are telling you what you think they are telling you” (Saunders et al., 2007, p.139). Yin (2003) classified case studies as single and multiple cases, depending on the number of cases used in the re-search. He also divides case studies into holistic studying a phenomenon in a single unit, and embedded when investigating more than one unit.

In this thesis, we will use a case study of a telecommunication company that has rebranded. Even though various sources of information will be used, triangulation of the sources is not appropriate for this research, since it will not measure one and the same thing. De-pending on the findings generalizations will be presented. Moreover, the case study will be holistic as the organization as a whole will be investigated.

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3.3 Research Method

There are two types of data collection techniques and data analysis procedures. The first type is quantitative which involves gathering and analyzing numerical data and statistical tools. Popular technique for such data collection is the questionnaire. The other type is qualitative involving non-numerical data. Qualitative research can be analyzed using words, pictures and video clips. The results of an interview or a focus group can be analyzed with this technique. In a research either only one technique can be used, known as mono me-thod, or more than one technique, known as multiple methods (Saunders et al., 2007). In this research multiple methods will be used by collecting data both through interviews and questionnaires.

3.4 Data Collection

The process of gathering information in the specific field of research and the observed case is needed in order to answer the research questions of this study. It is called data collection in the literature and can include primary and secondary data categories, according to the type of conducted research and the used sources. The secondary data comprises already available information for the researched area such as reports, newspapers whereas the pri-mary data is the information collected especially for the purpose of the research. Therefore collecting secondary data can be evaluated as a suitable tool for providing valuable informa-tion about already carried out investigations of the problem in hand. It is found to be an appropriate tool for gaining knowledge also in our researched area and it will be included in our data collection approach. Primary data will be collected, as well, through conducting in-terviews and questionnaires and will complement the information gathered on the re-searched topic (Saunders et al., 2007).

Table 3.1 Data collection.

Qualitative data Quantitative data

Type Semi-structured interviews Self-administered questionnaires

Respondents The management of the compa-ny

Employees of the company

Sampling method Non-probability; Judgmental Sampling

Non-probability; Judgmental Sampling

Distribution chan-nel

Internet and Telephone inter-views

Internet-mediated question-naires

Question formula-tion

On the basis of literature review On the basis of the information gathered from the interviews and the literature review

Question type Open questions Close questions

Data analysis techniques

Narrative Descriptive; Spearman`s Rank Order Correlation

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3.4.1 Secondary Data

Different classifications of secondary data can be found in the literature. According to Saunders et al. (2007), secondary data can be divided in:

documentary data e.g. organizational databases, organizational websites, reports;

survey-based data e.g. censuses, continuous and regular surveys, Ad hoc surveys;

multiple sources e.g. books, journals, industry statistics etc.

For the purposes of this study documentary secondary data will be used, which in general could represent written or non-written materials (Saunders et al., 2007), and also multiple-source secondary data, such as books and journals.

Literature review will be made as a multiple source secondary data, including gathering in-formation, related to the area of the present research from books, journals and articles. Thus the collected information serves as a base for conducting the study in hand and helps to develop the research idea and questions before starting to draw up the thesis and also along the way of writing it.

However, the multiple source secondary data is not the only type of secondary data that is going to be considered in the research. The research questions are investigated in the con-text of the case study of a telecommunication company. Therefore documentary secondary data such as organizational websites and written reports of the company`s rebranding process, communicated by the firm, will be present in the paper. Byrman (1898) claims that documentary secondary data is often used in researches in which primary data is also col-lected, which is the case in this study.

3.4.2 Primary Data

Malhotra and Birks (2006) define the primary data as the information originated by the re-searcher especially for the objectives of a particular study. In the primary data section of this thesis the sampling method and the sampling size will be presented, followed by de-scription of the chosen data collection instruments and data analysis techniques.

3.4.3 Sampling Method

Sampling techniques embrace different procedures for decreasing the quantity of informa-tion in the research through collecting information only from selected subgroups with rele-vant characteristics for the inquiry (Saunders et al., 2007). Since a case study strategy is adopted for this thesis investigating the internal rebranding of an organization, the sample of the research represents the company’s employees. Depending on the probability of which part of the population can be or cannot be selected to participate in the research, the sampling can be divided into the following major types (Saunders et al., 2007):

probability sampling;

non-probability sampling.

For the interviews, participants in the rebranding process in Vivacom from the marketing management were reached. Afterwards, the interviewees agreed to distribute the question-naire to a small number of employees, since distribution to a larger number of employees was not achievable. This makes the choice of respondents, non-probability judgmental sampling. In this type of non-probability sampling technique, the researcher selects the cas-

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es and the sample on the basis on her/his own judgment so that she/he will get the an-swers of the research questions and the purpose of the inquiry (Saunders et al., 2007). Af-terwards, only those respondents who met the criteria for being an employee before, during and after the rebranding of Vivacom in 2009 were included in the data analysis.

3.4.4 Interviews

Interviews are stated to be really useful for collecting reliable data and for adjusting the ob-jective and the research questions of this study. On one hand the questions asked on inter-views must reflect coherently the purpose of the research and the adopted research strate-gy, but the information collected during the interview can give more precise direction of these dimensions as well (Saunders et al., 2007). Saunders et al. (2007) identify three basic types of interviews, according to the degree of standardized questions and level of struc-ture:

structured interviews;

semi-structured interviews;

unstructured or in-depth interviews.

Structure interviews are intended to use strongly defined questions without any free inte-raction between the person who is interviewed and the one who conducts it whereas the unstructured interviews convey the process of open discussion between the participant and the administrator, without the presence of predetermined questionnaire. However, there is one version or type of interviews that carries a part of the characteristics of both types, which were described above. Because of its position in between, this type of interviews is called semi-structured interview and actually presents the kind of interviews that will be undertaken in this research study. The layout of the semi-structured interview includes list of themes and questions which have to be covered, but are not highly structured. The questions can vary depending on the flow of exchanged information between the adminis-trator and the interviewed person (Saunders et al., 2007).

Generally two semi-structured interviews with the management of the Bulgarian telecom-munication company Vivacom were carried out. One of the interviews was carried out vie Skype, and the other one was a telephone interview, since a personal interview was not possible to conduct due to the fact that the researchers are in Sweden and the interviewees are in Bulgaria. The questions asked on the interviews concerned the following topics: the rebranding decision, the company`s vision, mission, values, image after the rebranding, the internal communication strategy used in the process and the identification of employee re-sistance. After conducting them, the results served as a basis for developing the question-naires which were distributed to the employees of the organization. It should be noted that the interviews were held in Bulgarian and translated in English afterwards.

3.4.5 Questionnaires

Different definitions of a questionnaire exist in the research literature. Malhotra and Birks (2006, p. 326) define a questionnaire as “a structured technique for data collection consist-ing of a series of questions, written or verbal, that a respondent answers”, whereas deVaus (cited in Saunders et al., 2007, p. 360) determine the questionnaire as “a general term to in-clude all techniques of data collection in which each person is asked to respond to the same set of questions in a predetermined order”. The questionnaire is a suitable tool that can be used in a case study research. Several types of questionnaires can be identified according to

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Saunders et al. (2007), depending on the role of the administrator. If the administrator records the respondent`s answer after each question, the questionnaire can be categorized as interviewed-administered and if the respondent fills in the question form on her/his own, the questionnaire is self-administered (Saunders et al., 2007).

For the objectives of the present study, self-administered questionnaires were distributed to the employees of Vivacom. They were developed on the basis of the conducted interviews with the management of Vivacom as well as on the basis of the theoretical framework dis-cussed in Chapter 2. The questions of the questionnaires are divided in the following eight themes: company`s vision, values, image, source of messages, messages, psychological con-tract, employee resistance and demographics. They can be determined as internet-mediated questionnaires because their administration was electronical (Saunders et al., 2007). For this purpose Qualtrics was used for designing and sending the questionnaires.

The questionnaire developed in this thesis consists of one answer questions, multiple-choice questions and Likert scales. The Likert scale is widely used for measuring respon-dents` overall attitudes and opinions by indicating their level of agreement or disagreement with a series of statements about the stimulus object (Malhotra, 2004). The scale items in the questionnaire, designed for the purpose of this thesis, have five response options. The respondent`s total score for each category was calculated and the highest scores indicated the most favorable attitude towards the different category.

Before sending the questionnaire to the respondents, a pretest was conducted on the people who helped in the distribution, in order to test the questionnaire as a whole and to identify potential problems (Malhorta, 2004). This helped to eliminate such problems be-fore the official distribution of the questionnaires. As already mentioned, the respondents were reached with the assistance of the interviewees, who agreed to distribute the ques-tionnaire to a small number of employees. It should also be noted that the questionnaires were held in Bulgarian and translated in English afterwards.

3.5 Data Analysis

After being collected, the primary data in this research has to be analyzed in order to an-swer the research questions of this study. The primary data comprises collecting informa-tion through both quantitative and qualitative methods.

3.5.1 Analysis of the Qualitative Data

Distinct ways of analyzing qualitative data can be indicated in the literature. One common qualitative analysis procedure is adopted by many scholars in the field of research methods and it includes the transformation of collected information through the following steps (Saunders et al., 2007):

categorization;

unitising data;

recognizing relationships and developing the used categories in order to facilitate the explanation and analysis;

developing and testing theories to reach conclusions.

This procedure is found suitable for both highly structured and fairly structured interviews, regardless of the chosen research approach. As mentioned before in this paper, the inter-views were semi-structured and therefore the procedure explained above is appropriate to the analysis of the qualitative data.

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3.5.2 Analysis of the Quantitative Data

The quantitative data analysis in this thesis consists of descriptive statistics and non-parametric Spearman`s rank order correlation. The descriptive statistics includes frequency measures for the categorical variables, and measures for location and variability for the con-tinuous variables (Malhorta, 2004). The frequency distribution counts the number of res-ponses for different values of one variable and expresses them in percentage terms (Malho-tra, 2004). The mean is the average of the values calculated by summing all the elements in the set and dividing by the number of all elements (Malhorta, 2004). The standard devia-tion, on the other hand, is the square root of the variance (Malhorta, 2004).

Nonmetric correlation measures the relationship between two nonmetric variables and cal-culates the correlation by relying on rankings (Malhorta, 2004). Nonmetric variables do not assume a normal distribution and are useful for small-sized samples (Malhorta, 2004), which is the case with the sample of the present survey. For this reason, the nonmetric Spearman`s rank order correlation was conducted for examining the relationship between the variables (Malhorta, 2004). However, the nonmetric statistics are not so powerful and have lower sensitivity, which is their main disadvantage (Pallant, 2005).

3.5.2.1 Hypotheses Formation

As Miles & Mangold (2004) observe, the interpretations of the employees, and especially the employee brand image, depends highly on the sources of messages, the messages them-selves and the psychological contract. This led the authors to question the relationship be-tween the evaluations of these stages that the employees make. Therefore, the last research question “Is there a correlation between the employees` perceived image and the scores of evaluation of the channels, messages and changes in the rebranding process?” appeared. In order to answer the question three separate hypotheses will be created and then tested for correlation.

a) Is there a relationship between employees` image of Vivacom and the scores of evaluation of the channels used during the rebranding?

The null hypothesis (H0: ρ=0) is that there is no relationship between employees` perceived image and the scores of evaluation of the channels used during the rebranding. The alterna-

tive hypothesis (H1: ρ≠0) states that such relationship exists. The null hypothesis is rejected when the probability associated with the calculated value of the test statistic is less than the level of significance α (p

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the probability associated with the calculated value of the test statistic is less than the level of significance α (p

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pany rebranded a few years ago may mean that the memories or the views of the employees have blurred or faded away. That is why the responses in the questionnaires may not reflect perfectly the reality. In addition, the validity of the conclusions drawn from the question-naires was assured by the fact that the information from the interviews was used when de-signing the questionnaires for the company. Thus, the questions asked were more relevant to the company.

The external validity is related to the generalisability of the results from the research (Saunders et al., 2007). The fact that the goal of this paper is to investigate rebranding in only one company in one specific industry means that the findings and the conclusions will be applicable for this particular company. This paper will not provide conclusions which can be generalized for all companies that decide to rebrand.

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4 Case Findings

In this chapter the case of Vivacom will be presented. The results from the interviews and the documentation will be described in a logical way starting with background information, then discussing the new brand ele-ments and after that describing the external and internal rebranding. At the end of the chapter, the results from the questionnaire will be presented.

4.1 Qualitative Data Results

For the analysis of Vivacom`s case will be used a variety of documentation, which includes the corporate website, annual report, action plans for internal and external rebranding, and action plans for the campaigns. The interviews held were with the PR and Corporate Communications advisor and manager – Adriyana Mihaylova and Simona Tcharaktchieva. The information gathered from the interviews will also be presented.

4.1.1 Background

The Bulgarian Telecommunications Company (BTC) is a state owned company that tradi-tionally operated in the fixed telephony sphere. It is also the biggest telecom company in Bulgaria. In 2004, 65% the BTC capital was sold to Viva Ventures Holding, which is a sub-sidiary of the private equity fund Advent International. The next year a public offering was made for the remaining shares on the Bulgarian Stock Exchange. It was also granted a li-cense for third-generation mobile telecommunication systems and at the end of 2005 it launched the Vivatel brand which operated with mobile telephony. Meanwhile, there were other two competitors on the market – MobilTel and Globul. With their launching, Vivatel