corporate communications

Crisis Management – The Idiot’s Guide To Creating A Plan 3

Posted on by in Communications Strategy, Crisis Management, Crisis Management Guides, Public Relations and tagged , , , , , , , .

Preparing to Deal With a Crisis

Today, dear and faithful blog snorkellers, we’re going to look at the homework you need to do in preparation for dealing with a crisis, whenever it happens.

First, however, some home truths. You, the corporate communicator, do not own a crisis. Communication is key to the crisis management process – but so is the safety of your employees, customers and the community, operating within the law, making sure your business still does business, guaranteeing your suppliers and staff are paid and ensuring your records and data are safe.

The comms team protects corporate reputation and maintains stakeholder confidence, and is central to all aspects of the crisis management process – but we do not lead it, we do not own it and we are not the single most important thing.

Not so long ago, in a crisis simulation exercise, I felt that an operations person had been slow in providing my team with information fundamental to the external comms strategy.

In the heat of the moment, and in front of his colleagues, I said I didn’t care how busy he was maintaining his part of the business and that it was none of my concern. I was solely interested in the reputation and trust that would allow the business to function in the future, and that his duty was to help me achieve my goals. Needless to say, backs went up, and the situation has a couple of ugly moments.

I still believe I was right – but I had made the mistake of forgetting that comms works in tandem with all the other strands of crisis management. I’ll come back to the issue of who owns the crisis and how it might work in another post, but in the meantime, remember that, in all your preparation (as outlined below) you should involve others. It’ll make it easier later.

In preparation, these are the things you should consider:

Scenario planning – what are the issues that could affect your company, and how would your company be affected if one (or more) of them became reality? Make a bullet-point list of all of them.

Reserve statements and Q&A – bear in mind that when a crisis strikes, you will not have all the facts and you will not have had time to assess the situation. You may, however (dependent on the nature of the crisis), be expected to communicate immediately, without access to a spokesperson, or any form of approval process. Create a holding statement, or statements, if necessary leaving gaps for names and places, and get approval in advance. All the holding statement needs to do is acknowledge that something is happening, accept that information needs to be gathered and promise to issue further details within a specified timeframe. Looking at your scenario list, you should also be able to make a start on a generic Q&A document, which can be approved in advance. This will need updating on a regular basis.

Equipment and location – what will you need to run a communications centre? Computers, telephones, fax machines, whiteboards, headed paper, plain paper, envelopes, plastic folders, pens, staplers, desks, chairs – make a list. Bear in mind that your office may not be accessible – where would you go, and does that location have all the things you need?

Spokespeople and contact details – if you’re unlucky enough to face a crisis with immediate media interest, your reserve statements will only hold for so long – probably about half an hour – before you need to give a more detailed briefing. At this point, the media will want to hear from someone who isn’t part of the comms team – preferably a senior executive. You should create a bank of senior spokespeople, media trained and familiar with the crisis comms plan, on a rota and ready to be contacted at any time during their ‘on-call’ period. The comms team, the spokespeople and all those involved in the crisis management process should have a copy of the rota and a full contact list, containing the entire team’s contact details.

Holding and waiting areas – in that case of a full-blown crisis (especially one involving destruction of property or loss of life) the media are likely to be there before the emergency services, closely followed by the general public. You cannot afford to have either group simply milling around – they will inevitably stray into areas that may be unsafe, or restricted and they will ask questions that people may not be able to answer. You will need to provide areas where both groups can wait – if possible separately. Again, remember that your buildings may not be accessible – is there an alternative?

This is simply a starter. You will probably think of other things that you need to have, or need to do. Also bear in mind that, in the case of crisis involving death and/or destruction, you’ll be working with the emergency services, who have a tendency to take over. Be prepared, but also be flexible.

Next time, we’ll look at who owns the crisis in more detail, and who should be involved.

Crisis Management – The Idiot’s Guide To Creating A Plan 2

Posted on by in Communications Strategy, Crisis Management, Crisis Management Guides and tagged , , , , .

What’s a Crisis, Then?

Here’s a definition, that’s as good as any for our purposes – crisis (n.) an unstable period, esp one of extreme trouble or danger in politics, economics, etc.  As far as business is concerned, the effects of a good crisis on a business can include (but are not limited to) collapse of share price, destruction of reputation, loss of stakeholder confidence, legal action, job losses and possible custodial sentences for ‘responsible’ executives. Scary shit, as I’m sure you’d agree.

In answer to the inevitable question (et tu, dear blog snorkeller?) ‘who the living hell is this guy and what gives him the right to get all preachy on my arse?’, I’ll give you a few examples of crises that I, personally, have dealt with. It’s not a comprehensive list, and it doesn’t contain an example of every type of crisis, but it’s a nice lead in to what comes next.

  • The recall of a batch of product (food and drink category) that was shipped to retail outlets before the contamination was discovered
  • The employee who drank himself to death at a company ‘fun day’
  • The employee who fried himself in an electricity sub-station
  • The employee who stood where he shouldn’t and fell fifteen feet on to the concrete floor below
  • An unexpected and vitriolic local resident and media reaction to a casino planning application
  • The frightening tabloid media homophobic reaction to an (inadvertent) gay advertisement
  • The understandable tabloid media reaction to an iconoclastic (anti-religious?) advertisement
  • The media furore over a glamour model stabbing her boyfriend (to death) in a restaurant
  • The House of Commons early-day motion against the re-naming of a pub in Newcastle
  • The banning of the St George’s cross in a chain of British pubs during the Euro 2004 football tournament
  • The 12-month pay-freeze imposed on a company because the chairman misheard a journalist’s question
  • The failure of a £2.8bn bid for one company by another company

The point, which I hope has been suitably made, is that crises come at you from any angle. You will never be able to anticipate everything, no matter how hard you try, but some simple thought processes can help you prepare.

Often, real crises start from small niggly issues. As a corporate communications professional, it’s your job to be aware of the small niggly issues and, if you cannot see any immediately, then go out and find some. Every company – or client – has small niggly issues. You will not win any friends this way – trust me – and you will be seen as, variously, negative, cynical, and ‘not a team player’. The trick is to maintain your joie de vivre and your place at the heart of corporate culture while still being on the lookout for the small niggly issues.

A great example is Starbucks. Up until earlier this year (2009) Starbucks stores had a tap running into their sinks 24/7. It was to wash glasses and cups. It was to save time.

It was wasting water – at a time when the Green lobby was at its height. When questioned on it, however, Starbucks had no real answer – which translated into acres of negative media coverage. Simply put, no-one had looked out for the niggly issues, no-one was viewing the business from a slightly negative, ‘what-if’ perspective and – even if they were – no-one had the power or influence to tell the ops guys to turn the taps off. And they got busted.

No matter what your business is, it has potential to go wrong. And even if you think it doesn’t, then do not discount the influence of external factors and their ability to make your business go wrong – economic factors, medical factors, geographical factors, human/employee factors (think recession, pandemic, earthquake, terrorism) – anything that can affect your business probably will, sooner or later.

Here I’m going to name-check social media – this is a new danger. Social media allows for the proliferation of rumour, scuttlebutt and (ooooooh) employee dissatisfaction almost instantaneously and totally globally. Obviously, bigger and more established companies and brands are more at risk – because they’re more visible – but all companies, organisations and newsworthy individuals should have some form of monitoring process in place.

In summary, here’s the key points:

  • A crisis can come from anywhere
  • Look at your business – where could a crisis come from
  • Don’t stint yourself – it’s your job to be paranoid
  • You are the guardian of corporate reputation, and that’s what’s at stake
  • Don’t take ‘no’ for an answer – questioning practice is also avoidance of issues
  • Bring people on board – heads of department, key players – instil paranoia in them too
  • Monitor all channels for the beginnings of issues
  • Make a list of all the things that could happen – no matter how outrageous
  • Prepare yourself mentally for what might happen if things go wrong

Next time, we’ll talk about being prepared for the worst to happen.

Crisis Management – The Idiot’s Guide To Creating A Plan 1

Posted on by in Communications Strategy, Crisis Management, Crisis Management Guides and tagged , , , , , , , .

2009 Research by Burson Marsteller (a PR company) into European companies’ level of crisis-preparedness revealed that while 60% of companies polled had encountered some sort of crisis, 53% didn’t have a plan in place to deal with a crisis when it happens to them. Just so the full horror of this has time to sink in – I’ll repeat it in slightly different terms.

Over half of European companies, it would seem, are wholly unprepared for the ‘phone call at 3.00am that tells you your factory’s on fire, or one of your planes just came down. The Monday morning call from the Department of Health to say that hospitals up and down the country are stuffed to the gunwales with patients, poisoned by your range of ready meals. The sight of two of your workforce plummeting past the window, having been issued with badly-maintained harnesses. Your CEO shooting himself in the foot, describing your product range as ‘off the record, real shit, know what I mean’, or your CEO simply shooting himself, having realised that the whole fraud game is up.

Do I need to go on? Everyone knows that a good crisis – or sometimes just a minor issue – can destroy a company, brand, organisation, or person’s reputation overnight if it’s not handled in the right way. Think of the examples. Hoover and the flights debacle, Ratners, Nestle and the baby milk, Coke and Dasani, Thierry Henry, Goldman Sachs, Britney Spears, Enron, Exxon Mobil – the list is, quite literally, endless.

And still, over half of European companies do not have a crisis plan in place. Without labouring the point, a crisis can happen at any time, and it’s one of those strange serendipity things that at any time is exactly when crises do happen. There’s no warning and it will be the middle of the night – that much is guaranteed. It is tantamount to malpractice for any communicator daring to describe himself or herself as professional to ply their trade in, or on behalf of, a company that doesn’t have a plan in place. Think about that for a moment.

Of course, it’s easier said than done. If you’ve not created a plan before it might, understandably, seem a bit daunting – and it’s not made any easier by the fact that there are a million conflicting opinions on what a plan should look like and what it should contain.

It’s also all to easy to put off, or ignore. Hey – your company, or your client’s company has never had a crisis – why’s it going to start now? Anyway, how difficult can it be? And just think of the cost, time and effort involved in putting a plan together! All perfectly good arguments – until such time as you are bitch-slapped by the big, wet, metaphorical haddock of crisis. At which point you are going to be really, really, abjectly sorry. Trust me.

In a perfect world, one would expect the industry bodies, or the industry’s ‘bible’ (copyright PRWeek 2009), to provide a handy cut-and-out-keep guide for the benefit of their members and readers – something to get you started. But it’s not a perfect world, and they don’t. In fact, as far as I can see, during the lazy and brief trawl of t’internet I conducted earlier today, there’s not much out there that doesn’t have a price attached to it.

So, for the good of mankind, I’m going to do a partwork here, just for you, my faithful blog snorkellers. Over the next few days – could be weeks, depends how deeply I dive into my subject – I shall, I hope, give you enough information on the key aspects of crisis management for you to develop your own skeleton plan. I shall deal with what constitutes a crisis, when issues become crises, who is responsible for the various facets of a crisis, preparing for a crisis, communicating during a crisis, business continuity and getting back to normal after a crisis. And, most likely, one or two spin-off topics.

So – tomorrow, in Creating A Plan 2, I’ll deal with What Is A Crisis.

Corporate Communications – Doing God’s Work 3

Posted on by in Communications Strategy, External Communications, Public Relations and tagged , , , , , , , , .

More sequels than a Governator franchise. Anyway, this one’s for those committed blog snorkellers who’ve waded through my musings on the whole Goldman Sachs/Sunday Times ‘doing God’s work’ SNAFU. Earlier today, I posted links to commentary from the London Evening Standard (which I agree with), which say that Goldman’s have (and I’m paraphrasing) made the mother of all cock-ups with their attempt at public relations, and deserve the pillorying (doesn’t look right – pilloring? pillorising?) that they’re getting.

But then it struck me. (Well, I was watching TV last night, and there was an entire programme dedicated to it.) The London Evening Standard. Owned by a Russian. Ex-KGB. Is it too much to suppose that he (or those who may be backing him) might have an interest in destabilising a leading bank such as Goldman Sachs?

But, you’ll scoff, the original damning Goldman Sachs feature/interview was in The Sunday Times (of London). Yes. It was. Owned by one R Murdoch Esq. Who might also – and I don’t have to stretch my imagination too much – have an interest in destabilising the world’s economy, one bank at a time.

I think there’s more to this than meets the eye. Well, actually, for the sake of conspiracy theorists around the world, I hope there is.

Corporate Communications – Doing God’s Work 2

Posted on by in Communications Strategy, Crisis Management, External Communications, Public Relations and tagged , , , , , , , , .

 Last time, on ‘Doing God’s Work’. A global investment bank – let’s call them Goldman Sachs – breaks the silence of decades and has some of their senior executives interviewed, for a feature piece, by a medium with global reach – let’s call it The Sunday Times (of London). In the course of the interview, we discover that one of the senior executives likes big boats, that all their employees are being paid obscene amounts of money (nothing wrong with that, mind) and that the ultimate boss – let’s call him Lloyd Blankfein – believes he’s ‘doing God’s work’.

The whole thing raised few issues for me. On the one hand, I was impressed that their Corporate Communications head – let’s call him Lucas van Praag – had managed to get the notoriously secretive bank to ‘go public’ (if you like). I think I understood what they were up to – the threat of governments poking their legislative noses into the affairs of the world’s money-machines needed (needs?) to be averted, so what better than to open yourself to the media and demonstrate that, behind the hype and the rumour, you’re simply a business, under the same pressures as other businesses, trying to turn an honest dollar.

On the other hand, I think they (the Corporate Communications advisors) dropped a clanger. Unfortunately – so I thought – this big financial institution didn’t come off terribly well. The big boss wasn’t terribly likeable (and who cares what he’s really like – if he’s going to do media, he needs to pretend that he’s, at the least, human), quotations from employees simply reinforced the preconceptions and, frankly, no-one needs to know that they like big boats. I think we probably assumed that, anyway.

And then the ‘doing God’s work’ quotation. Well, I assumed (and when we assume, we make an ‘ass’ out of ‘u’ and ‘me’) (now I feel ill) that this was a joke that fell flat. A throwaway comment, made by a man with not too many social skills. However, this piece, from London’s Evening Standard, tells me otherwise. (Here’s another article, again from the Standard, which showed how they tried to spin it. Oooops.)

And so to today’s lesson, dear blog snorkellers. If you are a corporate communicator, and you are parading your top bods in front of the media, make sure that they are a) trained b) on-message and c) understand that this is not the time for off-the-cuffs. If you cannot tick the boxes against these three points, then do not proceed.

As Goldman Sachs has proved – a bad result is worse than no result at all, and, in their case, may have the opposite effect to the one they were (probably) looking for. Their performance has simply given the world’s media an interest in, and an excuse for, forensically examining everything they do. And guess what? There’s lots to write about.

Corporate Communications – The Role of Publicity

Posted on by in Communications Strategy, External Communications, Public Relations and tagged , , , , , , .

Without beating about the bush – “according to public relations scholarly conventions, publicity is a small part of public relations”.

Read the full thing here.

Further, as someone else put it “publicity is not considered among the higher forms of practice.”

Bollocks. 

What is meant by ‘publicity’? In what sense is it not considered among the higher forms of practice? What practice? By whom?

If we are talking about the PR or corporate communications industries, then I would humbly point out that publicity (of some sort, on some level) is the aim of everything that we do – from writing a news release, through the creation of the annual report, via investor relations, to lobbying of public figures.

‘Stunt’ PR is one way of generating publicity (and by ‘stunt’ PR, I include use of celebrity and also the publicising of celebrities themselves through use of their own celebrity)and I firmly believe that it needs to be subject to the ethics of our trade (amongst which are don’t lie, don’t misrepresent, don’t insult, belittle or demean).

But publicity is not ‘among the forms of practice’. Publicity IS the practice. A lot of the high falutin’, self-important practitioners would do very well to remember that.

You know who you are.