Crisis Management: Announcing A Layoff to a Round of Applause: Crisis communications When layoffs roil the corporate landscape, imagine telling 300 people that you are closing their plant and then, a few minutes later, they give you a round of applause and a standing ovation? It happened. Ron Vergakis, now an executive of another company, was manufacturing vice president […]

Crisis Management: An ER Chief Demonstrates Good Crisis Communications: Crisis communications Most hospitals know full well that their need to communicate is just a tragedy away from being tested. They prepare conscientiously. Retired Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center Associate Professor Dr. Ralph (Monty) Leonard, a veteran of journalism exposure, used to give his Emergency Room doctors a list […]

Crisis Management: Alert – Reporters may race to break your story first: Understanding the media The CEO – a client – was apoplectic. “How could this be happening,” he asked? A reporter was about to embarrass him: a journalist he knew on a first-name basis whose motivations he thought he understood. The reporter was proceeding full tilt to print […]

Crisis Management: Act Fast – Case 2: The need for speed The expression on the employees’ faces was unmistakable. They were NOT glad to see me. My unexpected appearance at their new company made them uneasy. The president was only slightly more comfortable. He admitted that this was the first time in more than a year that […]

Crisis Management: Act Fast – Case 1: The need for speed For those who doubt how fast their reputation can be sullied in the news media… General Douglas MacArthur once said that you can sum up the reasons why all battles are lost with these two words. Too late! Too late to train, anticipate, investigate, plan, decide, […]

Crisis Management: A Violent Attack on Company Property – Case Study: Crisis response The client said a security guard shot and killed a former employee attacking another worker – could I help? I grabbed my laptop and drove toward corporate headquarters trying to anticipate the unexpected with this case unfolding in a distant big city with big […]

Crisis Management: A Transplant Tragedy and the Response: Crisis response Before we talk about how Duke University Medical Center publicly handled the “botched” transplant surgery that ultimately killed Mexican teenager Jesica Santillan, let’s first agree on this. If your organization makes a mistake that contributes to the death of a child, you deserve the wrath of the […]

Crisis Management: A Sniper: Now What Do You Say?: Crisis Communications During that frightening sniper case in Maryland in late 2002, one look into the anguished face of then Montgomery County Police Chief Charles Moose told you how daunting communications were during the hunt for the Washington area snipers. How could he reassure the public and still […]

Crisis Management: A Case of Too Late: Crisis Response The 2004 Iraqi prisoner abuse scandal almost transcended crisis management PR. The humiliating photographs created worldwide disgust and mistrust of the United States. It was a bell that could not be un-rung. Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John Warner said it was “As serious as I have ever […]

Crisis Management: 9 popular crisis mgt tips that sometimes don’t work: Crisis response             “For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.”  Sage journalist H.L. Mencken said that and it applies to crisis management. Almost every typical philosophy for crisis resolution can be wrong: what helps here, might hurt there. In this […]