Mr Alhassan Andani, Managing Director of Stanbic Bank, Ghana, on Wednesday urged the government to develop a reputation management plan for the economy and ensure that majority of the people buy into it.

He suggested that the plan must identify key reputation threats and risks, and put together measures to transfer, avoid, manage, or mitigate them.

Mr Andani was speaking at a lecture organized by the Institute of Public Relations (IPR), Ghana, as part of its Annual Week celebrations in Accra.

The celebration, which was on the theme: "Managing Ghana's reputation as an emerging market," was to look at how the country could take advantage of its status as an emerging market to showcase its unique potentials to the rest of the world.

Mr Andani said the Executive would have to monitor and measure the quality of the country's reputation and its impact on all stakeholders, adding that the government must take ownership and work in concert with others to ensure its collective success.

"The value of a country's reputation could play a significant role in sustaining investor interest, increase appeal as investor destination, as well as reduce the risk of doing business in that country.

"We must manage our reputation as well as get the fundamentals right to be able to get and keep a place in the league of emerging markets," he added.

He said a good reputation was earned through hard work and yet could be quickly lost through misfortune and incompetence. "A good reputation could influence consumers in a far greater way than could ever be measured on a balance sheet."

Mr. Andani said the use of the internet and confluence technology had made it much easier to reach corners of the globe at the press of a button and cautioned that care would have to be taken on the way some local stories on the economy were sensationalized in the media.

He cautioned against the misuse of the media to destroy people's reputations saying, it would be difficult to reverse any damage done.

Mr Kojo Yankah, President of the IPR, said the lectures had come at an opportune time to update members' knowledge of their profession so they could rise above the "mediocrity" in the system.

He said there was a lot practitioners could do to shape the image of the country as it heads towards a market economy.

Source: GNA