Impressions of an annual report: an experimental study

Considerable research has sought to establish the use of impression management in corporate annual reports (CARS), especially in depicting the reporting organisation in as favourable a light as possible. Whether there is a useful outcome from the perspective of influencing those being managed has not been addressed. Based on the evidence that impression management mainly occurs in the front half, an experiment was conducted to examine whether readers’ perceptions of a company's performance differed depending on their assigned reading. Four similar groups rated the performance of an organisation in terms of several dimensions after completing their reading task, but no significant differences were found. Respondents in three groups approximate what may be termed “sophisticated users”, perhaps not easily impressed by the front half. The fourth group, homogeneous at university level but without the same financial background, ranked financial performance higher. Implications are drawn about the effectiveness of impression management.