1. CRISIS
COMMUNICATIONS
John Brissenden
03.02.09
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
2. TODAY’S LEARNING
OUTCOMES
To review the conventional wisdom on crisis
communications
To identify special characteristics of
international crisis communications
To consider the role of online communication,
postmodernism and of chaos theory
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
3. FURTHER READING
Tench & Yeomans (2006) Chapter 12
Seeger, M (2006) Best practices in crisis
communication: an expert panel process. Journal of
Applied Communication Research, 34 (3): 232 244
Taylor, M and Perry, D (2005) Diusion of traditional
and new media tactics in crisis communication. Public
Relations Review 31, 209-217
Tyler, L (2005) Towards a postmodern understanding
of crisis communication. Public Relations Review 31,
566-571
Seeger, M (2002) Chaos and crisis: propositions for a
general theory of crisis communication. Public
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
4. WHAT IS A CRISIS?
“A point of great dificulty or danger to
an organisation possibly threatening its
existence and continuity, that requires
decisive change.”
(Cornelissen, 2004)
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
5. MANAGEMENT FAILURE OR
ENVIRONMENTAL FORCES?
Natural, eg tsunami, hurricane
Technological, eg Mercedes-Benz A-Class
Confrontation, eg Shell and Brent Spar
Malevolence, eg Tylenol contamination
Skewed management values, eg Nick Leeson and Barings
Bank
Deception, eg deceiving employees about pension fund value
Management misconduct, eg Enron
Business and economic, eg dot com bubble
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
7. CRISIS TYPOLOGIES
“Cobra” (Seymour
Moore, 2000: 10) - “a
disaster that hits
suddenly and takes
the company
completely by surprise
and leaves it in a
crisis situation”
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
8. CRISIS TYPOLOGIES
“Cobra” (Seymour
Moore, 2000: 10) - “a
disaster that hits
suddenly and takes
the company
completely by surprise
and leaves it in a
crisis situation”
“Python” - “the slow-
burning crisis or
‘crisis creep’ - a
collection of issues
that steal up on the
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
9. KNOWN UNKNOWNS (BLACK,
1989)
Known unknown: mishaps
owing to the nature of the
organisation and its
activities, eg.
manufacturing or
processing
Unknown unknowns:
events that cannot be
predicted and that can
come about from
employees’ behaviour,
unconnected events or
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
11. KNOWN UNKNOWNS (BLACK,
1989)
“Now what is the message there? The message is that there are no
quot;knowns.quot; There are things we know that we know. There are
known unknowns. That is to say there are things that we now know
we don't know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are
things we don't know we don't know. So when we do the best we
can and we pull all this information together, and we then say well
that's basically what we see as the situation, that is really only the
known knowns and the known unknowns. And each year, we
discover a few more of those unknown unknowns.”
US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld
Press Conference at NATO Headquarters, Brussels, Belgium, June 6,
2002
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
13. MANAGING CRISES
Cataloguing potential crisis situations (the risk audit)
Devising policies for the prevention
Formulating strategies and tactics for dealing with
each potential crisis
Identifying who will be aected by them
Devising eective communications channels to those
aected
Testing everything
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
14. MANAGING THE
PROCESS
Audience Procedure
Definition Development
Pre-emptive
action
planning
Risk Audit Training
Testing
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
15. THE RISK AUDIT
Many approaches:
What has happened to the company in the past?
What has happened to other companies in the
same industry?
What would be the impact on the bottom line of
the identified risk?
Who are the audiences or public who could be
aected?
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
16. Be prepared
Provide background
information
Manage information
flow
Agree ground rules
Be authoritative
Principles of Crisis
Keep talking
Public Relations
Say you’re sorry
Harrison, S (1995)
Ensure accuracy
Be sensitive
Learn from experience
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
17. HOW DOES THE INTERNATIONAL DIMENSION
AFFECT A CRISIS?
Time:
Do timezones work against you or for you?
Time was always short, now it’s non-existent
Place:
The home/host country divide becomes greater
Culture:
Dierent expectations, sensitivities, agendas
Interconnectedness:
Multiplies unpredictability
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
18. ONLINE COMMUNICATION
AND INTERNATIONAL CRISES
“The media and other stakeholders demand an immediate,
thorough and unqualified response from organisations.
Anything less might be seen as stonewalling.” Seeger, Sellnow
Ulmer (2001): 160
Taylor Perry (2005) identify five innovative tactics used in
crisis communication:
Dialogic communication
Connecting links
Real-time monitoring
Multi-media eects
Online chat
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
19. POSTMODERNIST
APPROACH (TYLER, 2005)
Draws on Lyotard (1984), discredits and abandons all
totalising, universalising and essentialising grand narratives
in favour of multiple, simultaneous, competing local
narratives
Draws on Derrida - the organisation as text, or a
storytelling system (Boje, 1991, 1995): “An organisational
fiction is created that everyone is supposed to accept as
true, yet which noone believes to be true.” (Bergquist, 1993)
In crisis, competing, suppressed narratives erupt to counter
the dominant narrative
Sees traditional crisis communication as motivated by need
to control, and to restore the dominant narrative
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
20. CHAOS AND CRISIS
(SEEGER, 2002)
Chaos theory emphasises:
Lack of predictability in system behaviour
Unexpected and non-linear interactions between
components
Radical departures from normal system operations
The re-emergence of order through natural self-organising
processes
The goal of chaos theory is “to achieve some level of
predictive understanding, but without relying on established
causal and deterministic patterns and models and using
broader scales, perspectives and methods.” (Seeger, 2002: 330)
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
21. CHAOS THEORY AND
CRISIS COMMUNICATION
Precise and confident predictions regarding system performance are
impossible:
Explanations and predictions are not accurate within the context of
chaotic system disruption, and may contribute to the disruption itself
Communication itself may be seen as a disruptive element:
Small variances in communication processes, message form, content,
distribution, timing or other factors may produce wide fluctuations in
systems leading to disruption
Investigations should move beyond the immediate and short-term
dynamics of crisis, to larger patterns of self-organisation, reconstitution
and renewal over extended time frames
“Increases in organisational complexity require quite significant increases
in information flow, communication and cooordination.” (Comfort, et al,
2001) Extending the timeframe of analysis may reveal a more
comprehensive role for communication and public relations
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
26. Precision
Speed
Minimise risk
Traditional
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
27. Precision
Speed
Minimise risk
Traditional
Postmodern
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
28. Precision
Speed
Minimise risk
Traditional
Postmodern
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
29. Precision
Speed
Minimise risk
Traditional
Postmodern
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
30. Precision
Speed
Minimise risk
Traditional
Postmodern
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
31. Precision
Speed
Minimise risk
Traditional
Prioritise
victims
Admit “unofficial”
voices
Postmodern
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
32. Precision
Speed
Minimise risk
Traditional
Prioritise
victims
Admit “unofficial”
voices
Postmodern
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
33. Precision
Speed
Minimise risk
Traditional
Prioritise
victims
Admit “unofficial”
voices
Postmodern
Chaos
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
34. Precision
Speed
Minimise risk
Traditional
Prioritise
victims
Admit “unofficial”
voices
Postmodern
Chaos
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
35. Precision
Speed
Minimise risk
Traditional
Prioritise
victims
Admit “unofficial”
voices
Postmodern
Chaos
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
36. Precision
Speed
Minimise risk
Traditional
Prioritise
victims
Admit “unofficial”
voices
Postmodern
Change conceptual
frame of prediction
Longer time frame
Embrace risk
Identify non-linear and indirect
sources of disruption and
recovery
Chaos
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
37. Precision
Speed
Minimise risk
Traditional
Prioritise
victims
Admit “unofficial”
voices
Postmodern
Change conceptual
frame of prediction
Longer time frame
Embrace risk
Identify non-linear and indirect
sources of disruption and
recovery
Chaos
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
38. Precision
Speed
Minimise risk
Traditional
Prioritise
victims
Admit “unofficial”
voices
Postmodern
Change conceptual
frame of prediction
Longer time frame
Embrace risk
Identify non-linear and indirect
sources of disruption and
recovery
Chaos
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Hinweis der Redaktion
Note the links with the importance of understanding the publics and their communication needs
Procedure development: choose a cm team, clear responsibilities at planning stage and at time of crisis
Probably include md, head of pr, press officers, finance department rep, switchboard, etc…
Draw up plan that can be used when required – should be clear and easily understood, flexible
Should meet and review regularly, update contacts
Process is continual
Once completed, prioritise
Very simplistic
Can all crises be dealt with in the same way?
A backlash in pr thinking with regard to how crises can be handled strategically.