There are two ways we can approach this. A keynote or, and this is very popular with clients, a keynote plus a team crisis exercise.

The keynote itself is an interactive high-energy 90-minute presentation where participants learn the critical crisis leadership/management principles necessary to protect the reputations of their companies or institutions. I pack the presentation with real world examples and video clips to illustrate the points. Among the principles given are segments on decision-making, teamwork, speed,and internal as well as external communications.

The team crisis exercise adds another 90 minutes but clients love it because everyone gets to put into practice what they just heard. Here's how it works. We divide the audience into teams of about 5 people each. Each team has to tackle a crisis or two and decide a) the three most important actions to take, b) the three most important messages to deliver, and c) the three toughest questions to be answered. Each team reports out to the audience as a whole and, together, we compare and discuss what the teams decided. Obviously, the team exercise allows the audience to put into practice the principles I provided during the keynote.

Finally, to ensure that everyone retains what they have just seen and heard, I strongly suggest that each participant be provided the audio CD Rescue Your Reputation ($10 each) and wallet cards ($1 each) to reinforce the presentation information months and years later.