Vodacom tops JSE reputation list

Vodacom has taken first place in the Reputation Institute’s 2013 RepTrak Pulse survey, emerging with the best reputation amongst South Africa’s top 20 companies listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE).

The RepTrak Pulse survey measures the reputation of the largest listed SA companies. The seven reputation drivers used are products and services; innovation; performance; citizenship; workplace; governance; and leadership

The survey is conducted annually in January and February and collects over 3,000 ratings from the economically active segments of the general public.

Vodacom improved its score by 6.64 points to 74.17 from last year – a significant increase in all seven of the reputation drivers used by the annual survey.

“Vodacom’s success appears to be grounded on its holistic application of a strategy across all areas of its business,” said Reputation Institute’s Partner for Africa, Dominik Heil.

“Interestingly, the leadership score increased by 3.75 points, coinciding with the change in leadership in the company, its innovation score increased by 8.05 points and its products and services by 8.5 points, thus indicating a shift in its focus on innovation and quality of service.”

Trevor Ndlazi, Reputation Institute’s country manager for South Africa, added that the 2013 survey shows that, while South Africans still emphasise products and services, innovation is becoming consistently important.

Ndlazi said that if one had to look at this year’s global survey, Vodacom’s score is markedly higher than other international telecommunications companies.

The first such company ranks only 30 on the global survey, thus Vodacom’s score would have placed it at 17th position.

MTN, which came second in last year’s survey, has dropped down to fifth position – and Telkom has fallen off the list altogether.  Cell C has not been surveyed as it is not a listed company.

SA’s banks

South Africa’s big banks continue to rank within the top 20, with Sanlam and Standard Bank overtaking Absa this year, by over two points.

FNB continues to lead the banking industries with regard to reputation, overtaking Old Mutual. However, FNB was not rated among the top 20 listed companies, as it is a wholly-owned subsidiary and is not listed. Nedbank dropped to ninth position.

The scores of the top twenty listed companies in the 2013 Reputation Pulse were as follows:

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