Crisis Communications

Synopsis of the topic

 

Natural disasters cannot be avoided but there are many crises (human error, negligence, malicious intent) that planning could have prevented in the first place. Human-induced crises include cases in which the company is at fault and cases in which the company becomes a victim. According to Ray O’Rauke, here are the crisis characteristics: an element of surprise, insufficient information, the quick pace of events, and an intense scrutiny.  

 

Crises from the past 25 years:

1982: Johnson & Johnson’s Tylenol Recall. It turned a disaster into a triumph for the company. The company removed potentially deadly products from the shelves, decided to try to save the brand rather than come out with a new identity for the product, and reacted in a carrying and human way.

1990: The Perrier Benzene Scare: is an example of how not to handle a crisis. The company relied on the media to communicate its story, and there was a lack of internal communication and global coordination.

1993: The Pepsi-Cola’s Syringe Crisis. The company showed concern for the public and demonstrated resoluteness in getting to the bottom of the problem. It skillfully leveraged two other critical constituencies: the government and the media.

 

Crisis and the Internet:

Demonstrating genuine efforts to educate consumers and safeguard against threats is an important first step for a company to rebuild the trust many employees have lost in recent years, troubled by the potential threats of online transactions. Internet can make the voice of one individual louder than that of a major company.

 

How to prepare for crises:

The company must assess the risk, plan for crisis (use brainstorming), determine effect on constituencies, set communication objectives for potential crisis, analyze channel choice, assign a different team to each crisis, and plan for centralization.

 

Communicating during the crisis:

The company must get control of the situation, gather as much information as possible, set up a centralized crisis management center, communicate early and often, understand the media’s mission in the crisis, communicate directly with affected constituents, remember that business must continue, and make plans to avoid another crisis immediately.

 

Personal examples

 

In class we discussed the crisis of Coke India in 2003. Coke India was blamed to have pesticides in its Soft drinks. In this context we talked about how the crisis is to evaluate, how well prepared Coke India was, to deal with this crisis, and if Coke India could have avoided the crisis. Afterwards, we discussed recommendations of action, for the long- and the short-term, and which problems should be addressed first.

 

Another example is the Salmonella crisis at Sheetz, caused by tomatoes on the subs, in 2004. Sheetz acted really fast in searching for the cause of the Salmonella virus, and after detecting it in the tomatoes, they withdrew all tomatoes from circulation. After that they bought new tomatoes from a new supplier and the CEO in person, made himself a sandwich, put the tomato on it, and ate it in front of the press. This was a good step towards regaining the consumers trust.

 

Additional resources

 

- Hans-Juergen Bucher, (2002), Crisis communication and the Internet, [www page], First Monday, URL: http://www.firstmonday.org/Issues/issue7_4/bucher/index.html

 

- Bernstein Crisis Management, is a 13-year-old national consultancy providing the full range of crisis management services: vulnerability assessment, planning, training and simulations.

Website: http://www.bernsteincrisismanagement.com/

 

- It seems impossible to plan for crises you can’t even imagine. But a set of surprisingly simple tools can demolish mental barriers—and help managers think about the unthinkable.

Ian I. Mitroff and Murat C. Alpaslan, (2003), Preparing for Evil, [www page], Harvard business review, URL: http://harvardbusinessonline.hbsp.harvard.edu/hbsp/hbr/articles/article.jsp?ml_action=get-article&articleID=R0304J&ml_page=1