Transcript what is a crisis - Binus Repository

Mata kuliah
Tahun
: 00324 - CRISIS COMMUNICATION AND PUBLIC
RELATION
: 2010
PR‘S GROWING ROLE IN MARKETING
Pertemuan 21 – 22
By: Dr. Drs. Dominikus Tulasi, MM.
Learning Objectives
 Understanding the crisis communication
 List the key components of crisis communication
 Understand the diversity of crisis
communication
 Start to build a crisis plan
 Understand how communication convey the
right messages at the right time to the right
people.
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WHAT A CRISIS PLAN PROVIDES
When you find yourself in a crisis communication
situation you have one goal: to protect the reputation of
the organization by:
� communicating the right message;
� at the right time;
� to the right people.
Responding quickly and with confidence is the only
way your organization can seize control of the crisis
communication and turn it to your advantage. Look on
it as a wise investment.
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ELEMENTS OF A PLAN
What you’re developing is quite simple, really. To have a
clear and concise, proactive crisis communication plan you
need guidelines for:
� the right message;
� to whom that message should be told;
� who should tell it;
� the right time to tell it.
As part of that plan, you also need to understand how you
will communicate internally and agree on the above
elements as quickly as possible, ensuring that everyone
within your organization has the correct authority and signoff.
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ANNOYING THREATS
Most crises develop with great alacrity, and news of
the crisis travels around the world with the same
speed. Companies that have not equipped themselves
to deal with a crisis risk being confronted with a whole
series of particularly annoying threats:
� boycotts of the company’s products or services;
� collapse of the share price;
� serious legal claims;
� the loss of credit;
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� possible bankruptcy;
� serious damage to the company’s image and
reputation;
� threatened loss of corporate senior and
middle management;
� possible closure of the company or parts of it.
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WHAT IS A CRISIS
We’re not necessarily talking aircraft falling out of the
sky or ocean liners hitting icebergs. These are
certainly disasters that call for crisis communication,
but people’s lives do not need to be in danger for
there to be a crisis. For the rest of us who have an
interest in protecting a professional business
reputation, far lesser events can become crises.
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For example, in a period of three weeks, three
clients at Nick Leighton’s agency, Net Results, have
each had a crisis:
� A new business in the area of media: their very
visible general manager quit after one month in the
job.
� A real estate developer about to launch: their CEO
left and defrauded the company of millions of dollar
� A technology company: its CEO was questioned by
police after the death of an employee, whose
remains were found washed up on the local beach.
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COMMUNICATION FLOW
in the crisis communication plan. The flow is as follows, and
is shown in Figure 2.2:
a. A crisis is identified and brought to the attention of the
crisis communication point person.
b. The point person informs or brings together the complete
crisis committee.
c. While the crisis committee is in discussion, the
communication point should inform the press contact
team in case they are needed (at this point the
information dispersed may be on a ‘need to know’ basis
and may just be an alert that their time could be needed).
d. The crisis committee communicates the plan of action to
the communication point.
e. The communication point briefs the press contact team
and the spokespeople.
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COMMUNICATION FLOW
Crisis is identified
Calls a meeting of
The Crisis Committee
Decides Best Course
Of Action
‘Heads-Up’ To Press
Contact Team
Takes Action
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MORE COMMUNICATION NOTES
GETTING TOGETHER
If the crisis team members are not located in the same place
then there may be a need for more sophisticated
communication than all walking into the same office. More
critically, the crisis committee (the brain) needs to be in a
situation in which they can discuss the crisis and the suitable
communication. If dispersed and your office phones do not
support conference calls (or if there is a chance that no one
will be in the office at a time that a crisis hits) you might want
to prepare a conference-call facility. There are a number that
are secure and free to use on the web. The crisis
communication point is responsible for carrying out the
research in the planning stage in case it is called
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KEEPING TRACK OF THE PRESS
Who are the stakeholders of your organization?
Basically, when you find yourself in a crisis, who
will it affect? We identify these groups now
because, 1) we don’t want to forget a group in the
heat of the moment, and 2) the better we can
target groups of people, the better we can target
the correct press to communicate with them.
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Most usually, an organization will want to take care
of the following people:
� employees;
� customers;
� prospective customers;
� suppliers;
� investors (both private and institutional);
� community members.
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THE PLAN
Internal
Communication:
The Planning
process:
During A Crisis:
Crisis is identified
Calls a meeting of
The Crisis Committee
Decides Best Course
Of Action
Groundwork For The Crisis Team
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MORE COMMUNICATION NOTES—
WHO ARE YOUR CUSTOMERS?
Be conscious of who your customers are. Most companies sell
through a channel of some kind: a property developer sells
through real estate agents; a computer company may have
distributors and resellers. You need to be aware of all channel
partners because each will have their dedicated media and
messages will eventually have to be tailored for each target. Once
you have a list of your targets, you need to pass this to your press
contact team. They need to draw up a list of all media within each
group. There will be multiple media types (newspapers, trade
publications, TV, etc) and cross-over (same media for multiple
groups – often with a different contact point, for example, both the
business and local news editors of a newspaper).
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MORE COMMUNICATION NOTES—
WHO ARE YOUR CUSTOMERS?
Prioritization will be a factor of:
� Reach (number of people the media reach);
� Speed of broadcast (web pages are often posted within
minutes, a TV station in a matter of hours; obviously a
daily newspaper will be slower, and a monthly trade title
slower yet);
� Importance (some titles are considered more important
than others – that’s just the way it is);
� Existing relationship with the media (if you have a good
long-term relationship with an editor, you had better keep
him or her updated if you want to continue the good
relationship through the crisis and beyond).
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MORE COMMUNICATION NOTES—
WHO ARE YOUR CUSTOMERS?
TOOLS:
For each target that has been identified above, your
press contact team will be able to draw up a full contact
list – office phone numbers (with extensions or direct
numbers), mobile phone numbers, e-mail, fax, etc. As
with regular media relations, each press member has a
preferred method of communication (this should be
noted).
You should also be aware of what type of information
they will want to receive. A newspaper, for example, will
want to have still images.
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