Crisis Communication Plan

Crisis Communication Plan

Why the company need to have a comprehensive crisis communication plan?

CEO's these days resist communicating to media and do not want to share their organizational actions because of the fear of making a complete a mess of themselves in crisis. They usually refer to some recent events where this fear could be seen in its real state causing damage to the moral of the employees and reputation of the company resulting in decline of the stock prices and a guaranteed slot of disgrace on YouTube. MY job as Public Information Officer is to convince the CEO why it is important for him to engage with media.

Arguments to support the idea of CEO being the chief spokesperson

In social media's era every user is a reporter. News about a company if not true spreads out instantly, company needs to stake out in time to clean this mess and communicate quickly , this can be done only with a top spokesman denying the rumor which might nip in the bud of a huge loss. (Coombs 2013, p. 902-1045).

CEO's have concerns over time availability for the trainings of crisis management. This can be scheduled with smaller training sessions like of two or three hours max. These sessions can be made completely private and the tapes of practice sessions for the interviews can be destroyed.

CEO's have a usual perception that if they are a spokesperson they will be answering for every small incident taking place it's not like that. They are only asked to be the spokesperson after the severity of the crisis is being analyzed thoroughly and is recommended by the crisis management team.

They usually resist getting trained as trainings for individuals are considered quite boring instead they can be in small group training with other top executives which will lead to the consistency of response and often this is the only time when top management discusses possible crises over the same table.

CEO's are the best solution to be the spokesperson in crisis situation as

They can keep the employees from panicking as they can directly provide assurances of their interest.

When CEO expresses personal condolences to the affected family, it shows the concern of the top person of the organization, gaining loyalty of his employees.

If he is the spokesperson there is more authority on the strategies of the organization as he is the one responsible for the company's future.

An organization is all about the brand and reputation and a CEO is the face of this brand, if he speaks he keeps both of them intact.

CEO's are most carefully listened than any other person when it comes to the expertise and interests of the local and national economies.

To further aid the idea of benefits attached to good media relations and CEO as a spokes person a comprehensive Crisis communication plan is been formulated.

The plan

Purpose of the Crisis Communication Plan:

To manage formal communications through a proper channel in order to tackle crisis or negative rumors or perceptions building up about the association ...