Organizational Crisis Communication And Proper Preparation

By Gary Ward


Crisis communication is a way to defend an individual, company or organization where their reputation is being challenged by the public. These are unpredictable events where it can impact the performance of the organization seriously. It would also threaten the expectations of the stakeholders and may generate negative outcomes.

Preparation is essential to minimize the potential damage they will receive by having all the people concerned be informed of the things that are happening. The failure to do this will make the resolution longer and harder to achieve and may cause severe impacts on the reputation and finances. Here are some tips in proper preparation of organizational crisis communication at Washington city.

Anticipate all potential crises that can occur by having your team brainstorm or because something will happen after a big decision would be made. Doing this would make you realize that they can be prevented by changing some methods of operation currently existing. You will also have time to think about possible response rather than when pressured by an actual problem.

Identify the members of the team who be handling these situations which usually includes the head officers of every department. Hiring a consultant which specializes in doing this could be done and someone with special knowledge related with the crisis. It is not advisable to rely on legal counsels because their concerns are more with the legalities rather than with public opinion.

Train some spokespersons in advanced authorized to give statements from the organizations so they would be ready and prepared when crises break. Some are better in written communication while some are better in public speaking so accordingly assigned the responsibilities. Good leaders does not necessarily mean good public speakers that is why spokespersons are used instead.

They must be trained properly to know how to give the necessary information to the interested parties. It is easy for people to focus more on other things they said rather than the important details which can help the company. The training will help them get ready and minimize the chance of being misunderstood by the media and stakeholders.

A notification system must be established allowing you to reach your stakeholders by using different methods. This is to assure you that they will receive the message because some of them do not always check their emails or text messages or even answer calls. There is a technology now that lets you contact them continuously until they confirm.

A monitoring system should also be established in tracking down what is being said by the people about the crisis. Available technologies can help in doing this which are either free to be used or a paid one where additional services are offered. Monitoring their feedback would help you to adapt your strategies and tactics correctly.

Develop holding statements that would be sent to those involved whenever a crisis will happen after anticipating the possible ones that could happen. When it happens, assess the situation clearly before implementing the actions you have prepared for it in advance. Then analyze after on the things that you have learned from it and use them in preventing and preparing for another possible problem.




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