1. Careless Social Networking

Accept the reality that the internet is open to everyone, and pictures, video clips, online profiles and other personal information will be seen by people to whom you wouldn’t show them in the offline world. Particularly posting unguarded images and content on websites like Facebook, MySpace and YouTube tends to inflict harm on people’s reputations when they least expect it. If you decide to create your own pages and profiles on any of the social networking sites, consider that even the profiles of your friends and others you link to can have equally embarrassing consequences, even if you monitor your own content closely. Time to axe the friends with drunken party pictures and remove the video of the boating and sunbathing trip in liberal Spain. If you care about your reputation, that is.

2. Compromising Emails

Research from the trenches–conducted by Weber Shandwick and The Economist Intelligence Unit–reveals that 87% of global executives have either sent or received one electronic message (private e-mail, text or Twitter) by mistake. The research further states that while some e-mails are sent by accident, about one in four executives report that they’ve forwarded a private e-mail to someone else on purpose. Considering the millions of emails that are sent daily, the potential for reputation-dinging email-fallout is disconcerting to say the least. The solution, besides making doubly sure you don’t accidentally hit the ‘reply-all’ button, send emails in a heightened emotional state, or share confidential information with unauthorized others, may be more technology. You can install outbound email monitoring technology–if you’re working for a larger organization chances are this is already in place–or rely on your colleagues to monitor your emails for you. Email security provider Proofpoint commissioned a study, carried out by Forrester Research, which found that 41 percent of organizations with 20,000 or more employees have staff on payroll that either read your emails outright, with their attention trained on confidential information you may be leaking, intentionally or by accident, or they are analyzing your emails automatically via the aforementioned email auditing technology.

But when you’re the boss, even that may not help. CEO of Whole Foods Market John Mackey suffered a major lapse in judgment when he wrote an email to his board about the potential acquisition of competitor Wild Oats Markets, labeling the move as “the elimination of a rival.” This kind of language violated Federal Regulation rules and promptly landed Mackey in hot waters, primarily because the errant email made its way onto the desks of the Federal Trade Commission. But this was not Mackey’s only blunder as you’ll see in the next category. There are clearly a number of ways by which you could harm your reputation via email–the least of which would have you being called out by corporate monitors for violating their email policy. And that could get you fired.

3. Controversial Blogging

It’s bad when a line employee does it–companies frown upon this, frequently firing the offending blogger–but it’s a bona fide reputation-killer when a top-level executive does it. Back to e-mailer and Whole Foods chief John Mackey, who also turned out to be behind years of anonymous blog postings that, among other unflattering things, questioned the value of competitor Wild Oats’s stock, even predicting impending bankruptcy for the rival, all with the intention to buy Wild Oats once the shares hit rockbottom.

NPR program All Things Considered reported on its website that the Whole Foods CEO’s online conduct was considered “unethical and embarrassing” by business and legal experts. His controversial blogging practice earned Mackey a subsequent SEC investigation and a permanent stain on his reputation. Advocating what you believe in, in your blog postings is a good way to build your reputation. But make sure that it is done ethically, with transparency and that it doesn’t conflict with your brand message or it will end up burning you in the search engines.

4. Leaked Memos

Leaks to the media often come in form of memoranda, the unintended disclosure of which can have embarrassing consequences for their authors. And of course, the likelihood that they’ll end up online with their authors’ name in bold font is as certain as an eastern sunrise. There’s the New York Times report of a memo that was intended for the French Diplomatic Corps by the British Ambassador to Afghanistan, leaked to the French media, predicting that the NATO-led military campaign against the Taliban will fail. The ambassador added that the best solution for the country would be to install an “acceptable dictator,” according to the French paper who received the leak. Just Google Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles, and witness the British ambassador to Kabul’s permanent gaffe on his online resume.

Not an issue for the average C-level executive you think? Then consider a Wall Street Journal report about Yahoo!’s CEO Carol Bartz. As new chief executive Bartz was upset that someone at Yahoo! leaked her first company-wide memo to the media, after which she sent an admonishing memo to staff that promptly made its way to the media again. In the second leaked memo she referenced the first one by writing: “Plug the leaks”, and, “I hope whoever did it, feels bad enough to come forward and resign.” She added, “Maybe we should have a weekly bounty on such people. I will throw in the first thousand dollars.” The full memo includes other frank language that the CEO clearly wouldn’t want the public to see. It was obviously embarrassing for the then new Yahoo! Chief, and until she had the issue under control, she had to anticipate that any internal communication may have found its way to the outside. The perception that was created from the start, dinging her reputation, was that she had no control over her staff at Yahoo!. The solution was to initiate a more intimate dialog with staffers until they respected her enough to stop sabotaging her communication efforts.

5. Misstatements and fabrications

One of the most reputation-damaging and embarrassing mistakes executives make that inevitably gets plastered all over the internet, is an outright lie or fabrication of facts. Bloomberg News reports a story in which Microsemi CEO James Peterson has lied in SEC documents about having earned two degrees from Brigham Young University. The University however confirmed that Peterson received no degrees from them. To make matters worse the CEO initially went on the offensive, denying the accusations in an issued press release titled: Microsemi’s CEO Peterson Denies Misrepresenting Degrees From BYU.

In the release, Peterson stated that he “categorically” denied having misrepresented his degrees. This came after Bloomberg News first reported the allegations. Since then, Chip-maker Microsemi’s stock has dropped 54 percent.

Peterson’s punishment, according to Bloomberg, was to pay $100,000 to the company and forgo a bonus for the current fiscal year. In addition, Microsemi reportedly will also delay vesting their CEO’s stock grants by one year. No question though that the reputation loss Peterson suffered will be the biggest cost of his fabrications.

Charles Elson, director of the University of Delaware’s John Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance weighs in on the issue, posted online of course: “It’s not the degree, or lack thereof, it’s the misstatement to the board and the public that’s the issue.” He added, “When this has happened at other companies, the CEO has been terminated.” And whether or not this CEO will ultimately regain the trust of his board and his shareholders, the damage to his and the company’s reputation is done and visible for anyone who’s able to type their name into a search engine. Hundreds of postings are waiting to tell the story.

6. Slow or no reaction to rumors and criticism

Here again we can learn from the corner office of the executive suite as to what not to do in an era where everyone has a voice and everyone will be heard. Take former Home Depot CEO Robert Nardelli who was widely criticized in the media for his enormous compensation package–$200 million plus–when the company hadn’t been performing well for years. Nardelli, however, who was prone to stone-walling the media and even openly encouraged his directors to boycott a pivotal annual shareholders meeting in 2006 due to an anticipated PR attack by organized labor, did nothing to silence his critics. His lack of communication and perceived arrogant behavior, focused most of the media coverage Home Depot received, around its CEO as a “poster-child for excessive executive compensation”. News of Nardelli’s $210 million severance package only reinforced this distinction when he was ousted from Home Depot just a few months after the 2006 shareholder debacle. Then–again in the top job at Chrysler–Nardelli seemed to repeat his mistakes in not being transparent about his pay at the auto giant. The headline in the International Herald Tribune said it all: “Chrysler CEO’s silence about his pay does not help repair his reputation”. Stone-walling or hoping that bad press will die down and critics move on to other things is wishful thinking, particularly when shareholders, interest groups, and the media, including bloggers, are keeping ever closer tabs on executive compensation and the wheeling and dealing of Wall Street. A clear and transparent communication strategy is in order to protect one’s own reputation and that of the organization one represents.

7. Lack of executive presence on the web

We live in a time when having a well-designed website is imperative in business. This is backed by research that finds that a vast majority of executives look for information and overall impressions about others on the web; particularly on your website. The quality of your presence on the web is the first–and often only–chance you get to project credibility and earn initial respect. This need to impress is exacerbated by the fact that people have infinite choices for providers for just about any type of service or product presented online, as well as the reality that people make a snap decision–within seconds–whether or not they want to explore a relationship with you further. A well-designed and structurally sound website is not necessarily cheap though it doesn’t have to be prohibitively expensive either. When approaching a design firm, make sure that your brand message shines through in every aspect of your site and that the user experience is first and foremost in the site builder’s mind. You will have to provide this information to them based on your customers’ stories and the experiences they are looking for from your company.

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Get your copy of Executive Presence: The Art of Commanding Respect Like a CEO to delve deeper into the art and science of reputation management and what to do when you’re faced with a crisis that threatens to destroy your reputation and limits your chances of achieving a stellar executive presence.