The Crisis in Crisis Communications Part 2/Crisis Management

While I don't like to revisit old topics, I do find that crisis communications is one that deserves a review due to upcoming events. As I write this from the east coast of the US we sit waiting to see if Hurricane Earl is going to be a major event, a major pain in the butt or fizzle out all together. Sadly, events like this often do far more damage to emergency plans than helping.

First off, when a major natural event, assuming it can be forecast, is announced, we are treated to the 24 hour media cycle in full wrath of God type mode. This will be a disaster of biblical proportions etc. etc. Of course 9 out of 10 times the event can not live up to the hype and people feel almost cheated. Public officials of course will meet in a comfortable locations with lots of bottled water and ample fresh food and calmly go through their preparedness forms as if all events will simply roll out slowly and smoothly.

If there is one lesson that can be learned from Hurricane Katrina and the spill in the Gulf of Mexico, it is that there is no crisis plan that can simply be opened and followed. I find it humorous that people think that by sitting in a conference room and thumbing through a 3-ring binder they are prepared for an emergency situation. In fact the best thing to do is gather all of those binders, put them in a nice pile, strap on some explosives and blow them up. I use this metaphor because that is essentially what will happen in a true crisis.

All too often management believes that crisis are about containment and "staying on top of the situation." Trying to stay on top of a crisis is much like trying to stay on top of a bucking bronco without benefit of a bridle. The worst thing and, quite possible, the most dangerous, is that managers believe that by conducting drills or having a plan means they are ready for a crisis. This would be laughable were it not so tragic.

One year before Hurricane Katrina, city, state and Federal leaders in the Gulf region did an emergency drill of a fictional Hurricane Pam. The fictional hurricane followed Katrina's path almost to within 25 miles and its wind speeds were only 10 miles per hour stronger. The levee breeches and the failure to evacuate New Orleans were all anticipated and predicted. Yet when the storm became more than an exercise the following year, all agencies were completely unprepared. They froze, panicked and when one element of their plan fell apart they tossed the entire plan out the window and became totally reactive.

The other great example is NASA. The space agency had a great legacy of running disaster scenarios that tried to anticipate everything from a rocket disaster to men being stranded on the moon. Amazingly they predicted both the Challenger and Columbia disasters. But at some point senior management decided that it was bad for morale at NASA to think bad things and killed the project. So rather than have a check list of things to look for and avoid, NASA went blindly into each project and had multiple failures, each of which could have been avoided had some crisis review been conducted.

So then what do we do? How do we prevent the next crisis from becoming a disaster? Well the first step still works so stick with it. That is to plan, as best that we can, for an upcoming event. Granted we can not see it all, nor can we anticipate every possible outcome. But we shouldn't try too. We should also plan on how will we manage the event. In this case we need to practice keeping our cool, keeping open the channels of communication. We need to think both long term, AND short term. Ideally they will not oppose each other but we must be prepared for the eventuality they do. Lastly, we need to take action. This can be anything from a prepared statement stating an intention to investigate, (always a sensible and reasonable action item) to a full blown media offensive designed to get our message to key stakeholders and audiences.

Crisis are almost always survivable and in some cases may work out for the best. But the require planning, calm and most importantly leadership for everything to work.