François Baird: “There is concern the Mauritian financial sector is not properly evaluated”

François Baird is the Africa Chairman of Edelman, one of the world’s largest public relations firms better known for elaborating the Edelman Trust Barometer which is based on data collected in 27 countries. He discusses ways to achieve what he terms as ‘Trust Mauritius’.

BUSINESSMAG. What is the Trust Barometer and what purpose does it serve?

Edelman is one of the largest public relations firms in the world, and trust is essentially at the heart of everything we do. Unlike reputation, which is based on what you’ve done, trust is based on the expectation of what you are going to do in the future. In a connected world where there are no more secrets and information moves instantaneously, trust is probably the most important asset any person or business has.

Without trust, it does not matter how hard you work on your reputation, you are going to find it very difficult to have people support you because they expect you do to the right thing in the future. This is why we study trust.

We started on a small scale 14 years ago and release our findings at the world economic forum every year. It has now grown to encompass 27 countries and takes into account every continent with significant business interest. We find it is a very good barometer of the state of trust in the world.

BUSINESSMAG. What are parameters taken into consideration?

We look at the trust levels in the institutions. We start by looking at trust in four key institutions: non-governmental organisations, businesses, government and media. We also study industries and analyse which industries are more trustable than other industries.

There are basically four factors that determine trust. Firstly, the sector in which you are. Our findings show that technology is the most trusted sector while the financial services sector is the least trusted one.

The second factor is the country of origin. Our research shows that globally, countries like Germany and Sweden, UK, Japan and the US have a trust benefit while countries like India, China or Mexico are the least trusted.

Your ownership structure also plays a role. Edelman’s research demonstrates that family owned businesses are more trusted than listed companies or big conglomerates; except in Asia where the reverse is the case. Then again, it also depends on the kind of leadership in those companies as well...

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