bout de papier, Vol. 6, No. 3 (1988), pp. 29–31
One always wishes for greater age, wisdom, insight or argumentative powers in crises cases, but what is really needed is a formal crisis management plan. Such a plan need not anticipate the actual cause of the crisis, but it should contain policy statements and logistical procedures to reduce the trauma or paralysis of dealing with a crisis. There are two excellent books on the topic which I recommend: Crisis Management by Steven Fink, Amacom, 1986 (Prentice-Hall in Canada), and When You are the Headline by Robert B. Irvine, Dow Jones Irwin, 1987 (Oxford University Press in Canada). Every corporate communicator should either hire a crisis manager to construct a written plan or buy these books, or preferably both.
To whet the appetite for pre-crisis management, I will briefly compare a well-handled crisis to a poorly handled one. Fink’s account of the Tylenol incident and Irvine’s account of the Challenger explosion serve quite well.
Can You Schedule Your Crises?
Hardly. But that’s no reason not to plan many of your actions in advance. Dozens of tasks that will have to be performed during any type of crisis can be anticipated. These generic duties can be planned to conserve time during the crisis.
Many of us keep flashlights in our car, home or cottage. Crisis management is simply buying flashlights, checking the batteries, deciding what strategic locations; they should be in, and so on.
This pre-facto work pays dividends in public confidence and support as well as profits. A survey of Fortune 500 Chief Executives shows that companies without a crisis management plan report lingering effects of a crisis 2½ times longer than companies with a plan. Long after the crisis has past, the media will continue to judge you based on your treatment of them during the crisis.
A crisis is a turning point for better or worse. The crisis manager tries to make it for the better or reduce the negative impact. In fact, as Fink points out, crisis in Chinese is “Wei-Ji”, “, which is two words — danger and opportunity. Proper crisis management reduces the danger and increases the opportunity.
Just in case anyone thinks he/she can escape public scrutiny because of remote geography or by stonewalling, bafflegabbing or not talking to the media, beware. Remember Bhopal. You can’t hide.
One other dangerous myth is that crisis management is new. It has always been practiced; it’s just getting more sophisticated. Consider how far airlines have come. In the early days of airtravel, newsreel photographers liked to shoot dignitaries or Hollywood stars waving from the stairs of planes. PR people got the good idea of painting the airline’s name over the door, in order to get the free publicity. But, in the event of a crash, the first airline representative to arrive on the sdene knew to carry a bucket of white paint to obliterate the name before the photographers showed up. That was crisis management. Today it’s a two page, three-ring binder with such obscure facts as the nearest 24-hour crane operator.
Tylenol
In the Fall of 1982 somebody put cyanide in Tylenol capsules, resealed the packages, and replaced them on shelves in pharmacies and food stores in Chicago. Seven people died.
Tylenol
is made by McNeil Consumer Products whose parent company is Johnson and Johnson. Now all J & J executives have two copies of a written crisis management manual — one for home and one for office. But no such document existed at that time. Executives had to scramble for home phone numbers and even the names of people they wanted to reach.
Imagine the shock. J & J is in the health care business, but suddenly was being associated with deaths. Products designed for healing were killing people. Even without a written crisis management plan, J & J instinctively started doing the right thing. An alert PR staffer notified senior management of out-of-the-ordinary interest being shown by a Chicago Tribune reporter about Tylenol, J & J and McNeil. As soon as it was determined he was looking into a possible link between Tylenol and a recent death, senior management started to act. A helicopter was hired, facts were gathered and McNeil’s chairman Dave Collins was put in charge. Collins identified three priorities:
1) stop the killings, 2) come up with a reason for the killings, 3) provide assistance to those in trouble. While Collins worked, Tylenol became front page news — the wrong kind of news. One study showed that 90% of America knew about the deaths within the first week of the crisis. One newspaper columnist called it one of the most heavily covered news events since Vietnam.’ Yet J & J saved Tylenol, re-captured 98% of its former market and emerged a stronger company with almost no lasting side effects. J & J had recognized the crisis quickly, established a crisis management team which focused strictly on the crisis and maintained open communications with all concerned.
One moment when it could have gone the other way tells a tale of the value of knowing how media people work and how to work with, not against them. Early in the crisis reporters wanted to know the answer to an obvious question — Was there cyanide at any Tylenol plants or facilities? J & J’s VP of Public Relations, Lawrence Foster, checked and said there was no cyanide. Three days later an AP reporter called Foster on a Saturday night to confirm that there was indeed cyanide at McNeil. Foster checked again only to find he’d been wrong the first time and cyanide could be found on the premises.
What to do in this case was as formidable a test of a corporate communicator and his knowledge of how the media work as you’ll find. Foster called back and told the truth but went on to point out that cyanide was only used in quality assurance testing, was housed in a completely separate facility, was kept only in small quantities, and was all accounted for. It was impossible that any could have gotten into the capsules. Moreover, Foster asked for and received a pledge of secrecy from the reporter on the condition that Foster would release the reporter from the deal if any other media outlet got wind of the story. This worked because it was early in the crisis and J & J was perceived as a victim too. The reporter didn’t want to help create panic. The issue was contained.
While J & J had no crisis management plan, the company did not become so proficient by accident. Forty years before the Tylenol Crisis, the late Robert Wood Johnson, son of the founder of J& J enumerated four responsibilities of the company. In order, they are:
1. to the consumers
2. to the employees
3. to the communities they service
4. to the stockholders Hindsight shows that all the swift, effective and compassionate actions taken during the Tylenol crisis were true to this well articulated plan.
The Challenger Explosion
What happened at 73 seconds into the 25th space shuttle mission was an unthinkable human tragedy. January 28, 1986 was also an unfortunate and humble end to 25 years of highly successful corporate communications by NASA.
NASA’s charter has always stated that any employee may speak to the press or public without fear or retribution. The agency is open, accessible and friendly with the media. For 25 years, it helped create ’space junkies’ in the media. This policy paid dividends in budgets, public acceptance and political support.
I was the recipient of NASA charm and good will in the early 1980’s while on a junket to the Johnson Space Centre in Houston. To NASA, I was a completely unknown reporter on a highly speculative mission to gather data for possible syndication in far-off Canada. Yet I was given a royal tour and shown every courtesy possible. On a moment’s notice I was given seemingly infinite access to documents, tape, official spokespeople, astronauts — in fact whatever and whomever struck my fancy on my journalistic scavanger hunt. Suffice it to say, NASA knows how to handle reporters.
All this good will evaporated on that January 28 when NASA scheduled and then postponed press briefings on the explosion. The 4½ hour delay irreparably damaged media relations. The height of bitter irony is that NASA has had a plan for shuttle accidents in place since 1983 but did not follow it.
The Solution
A blue print for successful crisis management is well beyond the scope of a short article. A brief look at the solution, however, shows three loose categories: evaluation, compilation and communication. The first requires a good crisis manager to take a hard look at his/her organization’s weak points and evaluate vulnerabilities. Simple questions quantify the need:
1. What is a crisis for you? Is it getting your name in print, or not getting your name in print? An inability to continue the enterprise? Three angry phone calls or a chewing out by your boss?
2. What is the likelihood of a crisis occurring?
3. What type of crisis will it be?
4. How intense will it get, how quickly and for how long?
5. What degree of intensity can you, your colleague and your organization endure and for how long?
6. How interested will the media, government, regulatory bodies and protest groups be in your plight? (An InfoGlobe search of similar experiences will help.)
7. Might you be the cause or the victim of the crisis?
Chances are you’ll find the profile of organizations subject to a long crisis includes those which are public, government, highly visible or with a highly visible CEO, a critical industry or an entity with parallel problems in a ’sister’ or related field. The situations which lead to a crisis include loss of life, near loss of life, panic, demonstrated weakness or vasciliation, perceived weakness, moral offenses, conspiracies, bribes, misuse of public funds or situations which make good media copy.
Musing about these possibilities might lead to the following questions:
1. Who would be our spokespeople?
2. How much could they say?
3. Where would media calls go?
4. Who would handle the media?
5. Where would briefings be held and how often?
If these questions are answered with “don’t know” or “not sure”, it may be the needed catalyst for more planning. All attempts should be made to quantity the guestimates used to determine the possibility of a crisis. You will need to look for high impact and high probability areas (i.e. big problems tomorrow, not small problems, possibly never). Searching for ways to do business even in a crisis and paying more attention to the minor crisis that can lead to a major one are the first concrete steps you may take after this exercise.
Compilation requires the listing of information and resources you’ll need to manage the crisis when it hits. The first such lists may be mundane mission statements, overviews, goals, objectives, followed by information on the organization that everyone takes for granted – chain of command, responsibilities, spokespeople, logistics, outside help that can be called upon.
Since you can’t ’wing it’ with reporters any more than you can with security analysists, legislators, members of your board or regulatory commission, you’ll need lots of information on your organization. Safety records, biographies, fact sheets, human resources data are a good start. Even if you think it’s boring, compile it. Irvine quotes Al Rossiter Jr. of UPI as saying “A lot of PR people will sit on details because they are sure nobody is interested. We are. It may not show up in our copy, but to have that information to draw on gives the writer a much better perspective.”
You will also need:
1. Two telephone answering machines to keep the media informed in off-hours.
2. Telephone beepers (the silent kind, of course).
3. Still and video cameras for the record.
4. A tape machine for taping briefings, meetings and phone conversations.
5. Extra phone lines.
6. The capability to make audio and/or video dubs.
7. The ability to make transcripts of briefings or tapings.
8.
9. A rolodex to make a card file of all reporters on the scene including hotel, local and home phone numbers (so they can be contacted directly).
10. A checklist of people such as fire, police, ambulance, military, government, insurance companies, investors, critics, community leaders, lawyers.
11. A checklist of internal contacts in case they have to be told not to come in to work (radio stations are good for that task).
12. Extension cords, coffee urns etc.
13. The number of the manager of the local hamburger outlet so he can be phoned at 3 am if necessary to make up 200 burgers. (Similar numbers for first aid, blankets etc.)
The other half of the compilation game involves people. What kind of people are going to help you weather this storm? The main crisis management team should probably include the CEO, CFO, PR, Legal and perhaps HR representatives. But what about the switchboard operator and the people who will be on the toll-free hotlines? Will they have proper skills and patience to deal with the crisis? In the Spring of 1985, in Southern California, contaminated cheese was bought mainly by Hispanics and caused more than 30 deaths. Poison hot lines were flooded with more than 4,000 calls, but were staffed with only English-speaking nurses.
Everybody must have the same message. Any discrepancy will be a signal to the press that something funny is going on. You may need a list of retired employees, workers in similar enterprises or others to draw upon in times of crisis. Finally, a gopher or two will be worth their weight in gold by the third day. All in all, you need people who believe that giving the media people accurate information will be a big help in the long run. They need to like dealing with the media and answering “dumb” questions politely, over and over again.
The communications component to preplanning involves deciding in advance who will say what to whom and when. Also, why and where and how will be helpful to know.
Then, other questions arise: f 1. Briefing room — is it the right size? Does it need a blackboard, flip chart, bulletin board or other aids?
2. Will you need 24-hour facilities for media from different time zones?
3. How should security and other logistics change if at all?
4. Will you handle a visual story different from a print one?
5. How important is personal privacy to the key players?
6. How will you keep a record of your actions during the crisis?
7. Phone messages will come in dozens. Return them all and keep them with your notes in the back.
In a big crisis, the main communications target will be the press. Get to know the leaders, talk to them about their needs and perceptions. Be sure of what you’re saying and say it with confidence. Be very careful with good news and above all be honest.
Finally…
In reviewing the many examples of crises detailed in the two books I mentioned at the beginning of this article, I am struck by two things. First, you can plan for the future. It just takes the kind of long hours of insurance work senior managers are reluctant to allow internal communicators to do. But it should be done and it pays dividends. Second, the best plan in the world is no substitute for the right attitude. It may sound old-fashioned, but you can’t go far wrong telling the truth, kicking a difficult question up the line and keeping the people you serve, foremost on your priority list. Good will, support, profits, market share and other benefits will follow naturally.
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Originally published in bout de papier, Vol. 6, No. 3 (1988), pp. 29–31. Read the rest of this issue →
