Abstract. Nowadays, more than ever, society is a genuine environment for conducting organizational identity and image. Organizational identity proves to be a central element of the activities and organizational strategies. However, organizations can not hide behind images and brands of its own portfolio. If the organization would be wrong, surely this will be felt strongly at the image and at the organizational identity and also at the level of publics, including here consumers, suppliers, shareholders, employees and the community generally. Therefore, it is important to understand that, in times of crisis, communications and PR programs must be thought and targeted both externally, by organizational branding, and internal, through a program of vision. But these are two directions intertwining, so that organizational branding will be felt internal, inspired by the internal values and the organizational culture, and the vision will be the one who is going to transmit the corporate identity to external publics. This article aims to analyze, from this perspective, one of the latest image crisis, in the auto market, the one of the German producer Volkswagen.

Keywords: communication, public relations, organizational branding, image crisis, competitiveness.