One of the most important components of crisis response is effective communications, but to whom should you be talking and what should you be saying?
That depends on which stage your communications efforts are in:
- Initial Stage
- Primary Stage
- Recovery Stage
Let’s take a look at communications in these three stages.
Initial Stage
Making a Favorable First Impression
Just as in social situations you only have one chance to make a favorable first impression in the early moments of a crisis. The Initial Statement is how your organization makes that first impression on the jury in the court of public opinion comprised of your stakeholders.
Not to put too much pressure on you but you absolutely must get this right. So, here is a short table-top exercise to demonstrate how this is accomplished.
Tabletop exercise
You are the communications director for Elmwood City Energy (ECE), the local utility company that supplies electricity and natural gas in your area.
You just received a phone call from the company’s operations manager. Twenty minutes ago an explosion demolished a house in your service area. Fortunately, no one was home at the time of the explosion. When the fire department arrived they reported a strong odor of natural gas.
As a precaution, about 35 people in the neighborhood were evacuated to a local middle school gymnasium. The Red Cross is in the process of establishing an evacuation station there.
ECE has turned off the delivery lines in that area.
Selecting your audiences
A good rule of thumb is to address no more than three audiences with the Initial Statement. Are there other important audiences in this situation? Sure. However, you can address them later.
Don’t forget, the media is not your audience in most cases. The media is a conduit through which you can reach your audiences. To determine who they are start at the center of the crisis. Who is most directly impacted by the event? Undoubtedly you would select the owners of the home that was demolished as the most important audience.
Using your professional communicator’s judgment determine the emotions people are experiencing and their needs. Based on that analysis the next step is to develop a message for the homeowners that addresses their emotions and needs. This audience profile is useful in creating effective messages.
If these messages don’t address or acknowledge your audiences’ concerns, emotions and needs in the statement you’re just talking not communicating.
Then identify the next audience. That should be the people who were evacuated. They are concerned about safety and want to know when they can get back into their homes. By the way, they are probably mad about what’s going on.
The third audience might be customers near the area who are concerned about safety. The message you should give them is about what the company is doing in response to the explosion and what they should do if they detect natural gas.
Creating the Initial Statement shouldn’t take very long because at this stage of the crisis there is little confirmed information. Your media training program must include instructions on how to prepare an Initial Statement, a task that should take a trained spokesperson no more than 15 minutes to create.
Only use confirmed information. Don’t speculate or try to minimize the situation. During the interview if you don’t know the answer to a question say you don’t know then tell the reporter that as soon as that information becomes available you will let him or her know.
Initial Statement example
We are thankful no one was injured this morning. We are working with the fire department to determine the cause of the explosion and will meet with the homeowners later today.
As a precaution, we have shut off natural gas delivery to homes within a two-block area around the explosion.
We are also working with the fire department to determine when it is safe for our neighbors to return to their homes.
We know an incident such as this is unsettling. If you smell natural gas please call our Emergency Response Center at 555-5555.
When we have more information we will inform you by this process and it will be posted on our website at www.ElmwoodCityEnergy.com.
The Initial Statement should be delivered by a spokesperson distributed to the media and, if appropriate, posted on the homepage of your organization’s website no later than one hour after you are notified of the incident.
In a situation like this, it’s permissible for the spokesperson to refer to notes during the interview. In fact, he or she might say, “Let me refer to my notes so I can ensure our neighbors receive this important information.”
Primary Stage
Presenting a Broader Picture
The Primary Stage is a broader response that connects with more audiences and addresses a wider variety of issues than the Initial Response, especially in a fast-breaking incident.
Typically a crisis enters the Primary Stage, from a communicator’s perspective, when enough information becomes available to present a broader picture of the incident.
This will require you and your team to decide how to disseminate this information. Depending on the situation, your employees, local officials, state and federal government officials, suppliers, contractors and neighborhood organizations could be included in your communications.
Each new audience must be analyzed for their emotions and needs regarding the crisis and the best way to reach them with targeted communications must be determined.
Don’t forget your original audiences; they may still have needs and concerns or have new needs as the crisis develops. That has to do with the crisis center-of-gravity which will be discussed in a future article.
Recovery Stage
Repairing the Damage
The Recovery Stage supports your organization’s business resumption plan and repairs damage to its reputation. It is the time to communicate with appropriate audiences regarding what was learned through this situation and what, if anything, will change because of it.
Use the same process described above to identify audiences, their needs and concerns. In some cases the media won’t be the primary method for disseminating these messages. This is another instance where your professional judgment is important.
Some people affected by the crisis — for example the people who lost their home in this example — may never reach the Recovery Stage and your communications must be sensitive to that reality.
