Business Continuity

Associates

A Crises can be a reputation killer, brand killer, and trust killer … or not. These five key focus areas differentiate those institutions that mitigate and rebound from a crisis intact, from those that don’t.

1. Commitment to business continuity. Crisis management is foremost about business continuity, protecting the brand and galvanizing trust.
2. Commitment to being responsive versus reactive. A crisis responsive institution responds from the existence of a plan.  A crisis reactive institution reacts from the absence of a plan.  At first sign of crisis, the ignorant don’t panic because they don’t know what’s going on, and then later they panic precisely because they don’t know what’s going on, in the absence of a plan.
3. Commitment to a culture of values. Values define decision-making, promote “good behavior” and help to mitigate risk in a crisis.
4. Commitment to protecting brand resonance. Brand loyalty is earned by making daily deposits into the goodwill bank.
5. Commitment to defending the relevance and pride of the institution’s character. Who you are is more important than what you do.

Crisis management is not resolvable through conventional public relations strategies, tactics or approaches where crises are viewed organically and resolvable through ‘good’ communications. For example, in real crises, there is always more than the ‘event’, the catalyst of the issue.

There are real ‘back issues’, and even more threatening, real visible and less-visible opponents. These are always the overt and covert adversaries who are at the genesis of the crisis. They work in opposition to your crisis team. They are trying to keep the crisis alive, fan the flames of fear, and they wake up every day trying to undermine your credibility and the confidence of those who are essential to your success.

They can include competitors, trial lawyers, the traditional and new media, regulators and politicians, those looking to leverage stock prices, well-resourced NGO’s, and even disgruntled and very disengaged employees.

At its essence, crises are a war. And effective, experienced crisis management is similar to a high-stakes chess game whose objective is to protect the integrity of the brand, the pride of the employee family and the trust of the marketplace. But most importantly, experienced and skilled crisis management veterans understand that, at its root, crisis management always strives to protect the institution’s character.

An institution’s ‘character’ is an extension of how organizations make decisions. Crises normally involve accentuated, exaggerated and news-making demonstrations of ‘outrage’. Outrage increases the stakes and amplifies the emotional component of the crisis. What does this suggest?

One of the first objectives in effective crisis mitigation and management is removing the emotion. Emotion lies in the victim. The news media needs victims in order to have the theater that makes for great journalism. Like in all great theater, there must be a protagonist and an antagonist. Guess who is the antagonist? You. Remove the emotion and we remove the magnet that attracts media attention.

There are many effective strategies for managing and eliminating the emotional drivers in a crisis. Here are ten that reflect what I’ve learned from 35 years of experience and some very smart professionals who I had the privilege of working with. They represent a directional understanding of how experienced crisis management thinks.

1. Focus on addressing the apparent and less apparent human needs of the perceived victim.
2. Unless you know for sure, don’t over-reassure.
3. Put reassuring information in subordinate clauses.
4. Acknowledge uncertainty but the commitment to finding answers no matter how hard they try to hide.
5. Share dilemmas and challenges. Show your character and showcase your values.
6. Acknowledge diverse opinions and transition to your ‘must airs’. These are the issues you highlight in interviews.
7. Tolerate early over-reactions, don’t minimize public emotion but through your humanity and values migrate toward balance.
8. Let communities know what to expect.
9. Acknowledge errors, mistakes, deficiencies in the context of values / decision-processes.
10. Engage your ‘hidden’ army.
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