Oats and Honesty : Organisational Transparency Measured Through Audience Perceptions

Sammanfattning: Our modern society posts high demands for transparency, not least regarding organisational communication. The perception that the power of defining transparency lies with the audience aimed to perceive it has reached great academic anchoring, but research on the field is thin. The Swedish lifestyle company Oatly describes itself as transparent, but with a number of hypotheses the authors of this thesis essay examine whether their audience agrees. The study also investigates which key factors are contributing to the audience’s perception of the company’s communication. The study is both theoretically and empirically based on a model created by Rawlins (2009), in which four main categories determine an organisation’s transparency; Participation, Substantial Information, Accountability and Secretive. The empirical studies (an internet survey with 346 respondents and 4 conversational interviews) offered evidence which manifests trends among the audience. Oatly’s clear and accessible communication, trustworthiness and humor turned out to be key factors contributing to the audience perceiving Oatly as very transparent. The perception of Oatly’s transparency seemed to be created when the audience interacted with the company, their friends or product packagings, rather than when they were given information through a one-way channel. This thesis essay consequently concludes with an appeal for further research on the notion of transparency to - in order to achieve validity - be put in a modern context where mobility and social interaction are central concepts.