Reputations of Organizations and Branding

Many organizations or companies have a reputation for producing a certain good or performing a certain service.  However, some organizations become more well known for their services than others.  This allows for the formation of a brand.  The brand allows for an increase in loyalty for the designated organization in comparison to its competitors.  Ultimately, brands are generally more popular than their alternatives due to having a better reputation when compared to other companies that produce a similar service or product.

One example of a company that holds a household brand name is Google.  There are many search engines on the internet such as Ask, Yahoo, and Bing.  However, Google is the most dominant search engine.  Essentially, there was a reputation that Google provided the best search results and thus, word got around about this and everyone started using Google search engine.  Google's reputation expanded on to become a brand when people started associating internet searches with Google itself.  People began to refer to these internet searches as Google.  In other words, Google essentially became a verb synonymous with the act of searching the internet.  

Essentially, Google search engine provided free services that were useful and generated its revenue from advertising.  Already having established a strong reputation and becoming a household brand due to providing the best quality search engine, Google was ultimately able to expand into other markets such as email and was able to buy out and acquire other organizations under its name such as Android which was initially backed by Google.  Ultimately, these ventures were successful due to Google's reputation for producing high quality search results.  This allowed for Google to have a strong loyal support base from people all around the world.  Since people trusted Google before they continued to trust the other products and services Google provided.  Basically, Google's reputation for providing high quality searches carried over to its product which further strengthened its reputation and brand.  Ultimately, it is conclusive that to have a reputation, an organization has to make itself known for its services.  While having a brand requires being the best producer of this service.      

Personal Reputation

Personal reputations can easily be a factor that influences behavior of oneself and others around oneself.  In a previous post I talked about how I was involved in the leadership for the Illini Chess Club and its associated traveling team.  One of the factors for how I attained a leadership position in the club was due to my reputation for being a strong chess player.  In order to be a leader of a club or organization, one should be knowledgeable on a relatively deep level about the activities that are being organized.  With my expertise being known in the club, weaker members of the club are willing to hear my advice on how to improve their game.  They are able to reflect on my thoughts and ideas and consider changing their existing habits in a way that will increase their competitiveness against other players.  Just hearing about how stronger players approach the game and think about different positions is very beneficial as one will be able to develop a better approach to the game.

Of course, I was not always a strong player.  My reputation and skill developed through hard work.  In order to become a strong player I had to utilize various chess resources.  When I was younger I read many chess books.  I solved thousands of chess puzzles and I even watched various chess DVDs.  However, just studying and being knowledgeable is not enough to be good at the game.  The problem with just studying and not playing is that one will not be able to fully apply the material learned from the chess resources.  So of course the most important component of being a strong chess player is being able to play games and being able to apply the knowledge acquired from various resources.

This brings up a critical question: how is chess strength measured?  Chess strength is measured through an ELO rating system which is a rating system that tells individuals that a higher rated players are stronger players.  Essentially people who are 100 rating points higher than their opponent have an expectancy of scoring the win at 64% while a 200 point gap would indicate an expected likelihood of scoring a win at 76%.  The expected likelihood of winning goes up for the higher rated player the greater the rating point gap is.  Essentially, Chess has 3 results which are a win, loss or draw.  Winners increase their rating depending on their opponents rating and losers will lose the exact corresponding amount.  A draw will cause the higher rated player to also lose points and  there will be a similar transaction with the lower rated player,but the magnitude will be much smaller as it is not such an unfavorable result.

The US chess federation records the ratings of players in the US and produces a ranking and a percentile, so that people can see how they compare with others.  Currently I am ranked about 300th in the entire nation for everyone 21 years and under and rank in the 99th percentile and this lends me credibility and a reputation for being a strong player.

In order to keep my reputation intact and strive to become stronger I play many quick games online to practice and analyze my games with computer programs and databases.  Furthermore, when I can I play in tournaments and some of these games are quite intense and can last upwards of 6 hours.  It's also important to have a healthy lifestyle in order to continue to have energy in the final hours of the game and this is something that I need to improve upon.

There are occasions where I'd like to stray away from my reputation and behavior and put the game away.  Sometimes I question whether it is worth continuing to put in all this time to improve on a game.  However, when these occasions arise I try to imagine my life without the game and it seems like it would be a difficult lifestyle change if I just stopped playing since it has affected my life for years.  Furthermore, it is hard to let go of something that you become so good at and it keeps sucking you back in.  I would say chess is almost like an addiction for me.  I do not believe I have ever cashed in on my reputation as it does not really make sense in the context of this reputation.