How can Corporate Communications professionals collaborate to create a successful crisis communication plan?

Comms experts and organizational cultures will differ on this point: but, don't assume the CEO should lead your crisis team. Your CEO needs to continue to run the business and may or may not be the spokesperson. The response will benefit from someone who is dedicated to leading the crisis team. Secondly, consider setting up two layers: with a lead team and wider advisory team - with the lead team taking the "hard decisions". Thirdly, from the outset be clear about roles-&-responsibilities and expectations around ways of working; including record keeping, confidentiality etc. Finally: always, ALWAYS lead with compassion. A crisis affects PEOPLE (as well as a bottom line, inventory, real estate etc.) Make compassion your guiding star!

On top of credibility and relevant skills, it is vital that the spokesperson has an absolute knowledge of the domain and a thousand drills under their belt.

An often overlooked aspect of the crisis team is internal communications. During times of crisis, employees need to know what's happening and what they can or cannot say in their capacity as an employee. More often than not, crisis teams tend to focus externally, whereas an internal focus can also be beneficial. This also helps with long-term employee engagement, as it shows an openness to transparency from leaders in the organization.

A 360 degree preparedness for crisis is imperative. As a crisis management professional one needs to ensure all their bases are covered. Identifying the right resources to creating a plan in anticipation well ahead, it all comes handy in times of need.

Timing for the roll out of responses is critical. Sharing some information might be urgent to curb the initial negative impact caused by the crisis. Silence for too long is sometimes misunderstood as 'not caring' or trying to hide something which erodes trust. Also, while assessing the situation and planning for External stakeholders, the internal team should be planned for as well.

You'll want to put regular touch-bases into the dairy for your crisis team, as often information about the situation can come through bit by bit. So it can take a while for the full picture to become clear. You often have to start to discuss and take decisions knowing more info will come to light as the hours/ days pass. How frequent your meetings are will depend on the nature of what you're dealing with. It could be multiple times a day or daily, and you will also want to think about meetings/ calls vs. email/ Teams updates.

Basically you gotta be ready to ask the “dumb” questions. Use short words. Ie: Who is involved? How long until …? What is happening here and now? What is coming up next? What are we doing? Now is not the time for long jargon words or lengthy documents or explanations. Short. Sharp. Facts.

Once a crisis occurs, it's imperative that the crisis team receive and coordinate all information related to the incident. This means each member of the team should reach out to affected individuals or groups in their area to determine the details and to seek input as to what occurred. The team should use the newspaper axiom of who, what, when, where, why and how. Once the information is gathered, it must be analyzed to form the response and messaging.

At the earliest stages of a crisis, it's imperative to manage perfectly the "golden hour". In the first 60 minutes of the crisis there's very little you can say, but you must tell the world that you're well aware of what's happening, you're handling all the issues, and your top priority is to protect people and minimize the overall impact of events. The initial response should be immediate, come from the company's top leaders, and target in particular people who are impacted or who have suffered casualties. The most effective message you can share in this phase is "We care and we're taking care", and it makes a huge difference in how the crisis will be perceived as things evolve.

Although they will not be perfect and will need to be modified according to the specifics of the crisis, it is absolutely crucial to have draft content for your most likely crisis scenarios vetted and agreed upon ahead of time: holding statements, emails to the board, employees, affected vendor partners, etc., internal comms, media releases, talking points, FAQs, social posts, etc. Having a solid foundation to start from when time is of the essence and emotions are heightened can be a lifesaver.

In a crisis, organizations need clear goals and decision-making principles to respond effectively. Shared objectives and guidelines empower team members to make sound decisions and communicate key messages consistently. This principled approach addresses stakeholders' concerns while protecting the organization's reputation. Goal-setting and decision principles enable fluid communication and unified crisis response, helping organizations navigate challenges. In turbulent times, proven decision principles empower teams to choose the right path forward. Facing a crisis together, not alone, organizations can uphold reputations despite challenges.

Collaboration is pivotal for corporate communications professionals in devising a successful crisis communication strategy. Firstly, the team should conduct a thorough risk assessment and identify potential crisis scenarios. Next, they must establish clear messaging guidelines and a hierarchy of communication channels. By involving key contributors, a unified strategy can be crafted that aligns with the organization's values and goals. Continuous scenario planning, including message testing and media training, helps ensure the strategy is adaptable and ready for implementation when needed to effectively navigate and mitigate crises.

Once you've identified the stakeholders - it is important to assign a key leader who will "own" that group for messaging, feedback and being their voice in the larger team. Beyond the public facing spokesperson - these key leaders will keep the interests of the stakeholders front and center as messaging and the crisis evolve.

One SOLID tip I can offer: - For review of talking points and FAQs, create a small slack/MS teams group with HR, PR, ER, CC, Legal and Business leaders. - Instead of sending multiple versions via email, chat group helps in getting job faster

Test the plan! I can't stress enough the importance of taking the plan off the page and into a simulated real-life scenario. If budget allows, this is better done by a third party agency. My experience when run internally is that people don't take it as seriously as they should. Ensure there are de-brief sessions booked to properly analyze how the crisis plan was used, any weaknesses in the process and ways to improve. A relatively modest investment in time and resource once a year can pay for itself many times over if and when a crisis hits.

Agreed with other views here to test the plans. But when you test crisis plans, you will soon find out how nothing really goes to plan. In a real crisis or emerging disaster, executing a plan should be simple. Why isn’t it often simple? Because too many cooks in the kitchen want to tinker with public messaging. As in, too much bureaucracy. There needs to be a very clear line of command from the CEO to the Comms lead, who has the autonomy and authority to Hit “send”, “publish”, stand up at a press conference and speak truth, text “yes”, etc Test your plans by all means. But ensure you test your lines of internal authorities to avoid a Cluster??

Be simple. Stick to a few, short, clear, relevant messages, map who has to communicate to which audience and set f2f meetings with them, if possible, keep the list of Q&A reasonably short, be consistent with all targets and across all channels, collect feedback to quickly address emerging issues and to plan further actions.

Simulations and continuous practice in crisis management are vital for preparedness. Even though real crisis situations are greatly different compared to made believed simulations, they do provide some form of "reference" in handling the situation. Regularly conducting simulations and drills helps in honing the crisis management skills of the team, identifying gaps, and improving response capabilities. In addition, support from management is critical and necessary resources, authority, and guidance are extended to the Communication team. This includes understanding the challenges and complexities of crisis communication in the age of social media and supporting the team in making tough decisions in real-time.

The time to handle a crisis is before the crisis occurs. That means having a crisis communication plan that has been developed with input from various stakeholders and has been tested on a regular basis with periodic table top exercises. Once the plan is implemented, the team must solicit feedback from stakeholders to ensure that the message is being heard and the message is helping the organization in its efforts to mitigate any reputation or brand damage.

Flexibility and the means to rapidly adapt in a crisis situation is critical, but so to is a deep understanding of your plan and preparedness. In particular, understanding the foundations of a crisis plan and the principles to which you should continuously adhere - this should include effectively managing expectations of critical stakeholders, plus ensuring timely, regular communication, even when there seems to be little new developments.

A crisis communication plan provides guidance during a crisis but it is neither one-size-fits-all nor is it static. No matter how many plans you have, there will always be a crisis you didn't think of. Once that crisis occurs, the basics of the plan form the foundation of the response, but must be adaptable to the new circumstances. For example, at my university I had plans for a variety of situations. One I didn't plan for was the murder of a student. Our basic plan got us started, but we had to adapt quickly to ever-changing information and needs of our constituents.

As others have said, there's no point in appointing a fire marshall once the building's already on fire. This needs to be done in advance so if something does go horribly wrong you're prepared. And in the same way you'd have fire drills, the crisis management plan probably needs to be tested from time to time. And I've called it a crisis management plan rather than a crisis communication plan because just telling people something's gone horribly wrong isn't going to work if you're not actually doing anything meaningful about the crisis. The comms team need to be working closely with the people trying to manage the crisis. That includes internal team members but could also include external parties - product recall insurers, for instance.

When assembling the crisis team, it's key to collect everyone's input on all potential crisis scenarios before constructing appropriate plans for each. Its also necessary to designate a central 'command control' lead, as well as establish a clear chain of communication within the team to ensure comms are efficient and well managed. I also recommend investing in a reliable listening service - this is an invaluable resource to help guage media and public sentiment and shape how best to adjust. Lastly, a post crisis strategy is just as critical - from whether there should be a quiet period, to whether a fresh, new brand campaign is warranted. Determining what is appropriate afterwards will vary depending on the crisis itself.

After a crisis has passed, it’s important to analyze and evaluate your communications effectiveness so that lessons learned can be applied in future crises. In addition to the information you gather in your media coverage analysis ask yourself: ? How did people first learn about the crisis? ? How effective was your response? ? Did you convey the correct messages? ? Whom did you offend, isolate or fail to reach? ? Did you deviate from your crisis communications plan? If so, how? ? What’s missing from your plan?

Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) can hinder crisis management if they are not practical and realistic. It is important to ensure that SOPs are designed with practicality in mind, taking into consideration the unique challenges of each crisis situation. This allows for flexibility and adaptability in managing the crisis effectively. Keeping a comprehensive record of the happenings during a crisis is crucial for future audit investigations. This includes documenting all communication efforts, decisions made, and actions taken during the crisis. Having a detailed record helps in conducting thorough post-crisis evaluations, identifying areas for improvement, and learning from the experience.

This is a critical step many miss because it's hard. But it isn't hard anymore! Ask your employees a single open-ended question: How could we have done better during this crisis? Once you have answers let AI do the first pass on the interpretation. Ask your preferred AI partner (ChatGPT, synthesia, copilot, Bard, etc) to refine the data into themes. Spot check the themes. If the AI is on the right track keep going and let it be your brainstorming partner for how to make the improvements people are asking for. Then, and this is crucial, tell the employees what you heard and what changes will be implemented next time. This builds trust and enhances two-way communication.

The oft neglected ‘postmortem’ gets lost when it is not weaved into the crisis plan itself. After the ordeal is over, this undertaking can be overwhelming. Make the post-crisis analysis a priority from the get-go. Ask the team to begin funneling results, lessons learned, and anecdotal comments from stakeholders into this component after each step of the plan unfolds. With facts and experiences documented in real time, the wrap-up analysis becomes faster, easier…and far more accurate.

Once again, I agree Wendy. I think the temptation can be to breathe a huge sigh of relief that you have got through the situation and get back to the regular day-to-day. But it is so important to review and assess whilst the experience is still very fresh in your mind. And as you say, make changes to your plans based on learnings from the situation you've just managed.

Ensure there is a senior executive sponsor - often this would be the Chief Operating Officer (or Chief Communications Officer if that role exists). Crisis comms is often pushed to the back of the queue when it comes to priortising workload "we have a plan, we know where it is if we need it" etc. Having a senior executive to mandate the development, testing and review of the plan is critical in ensuring that, if and when it's needed, it's fit for purpose.

Be comfortable with being vulnerable. Check in with your industry peers and contacts to see what they are encountering. By pressure testing with trusted strategic communicators, you can get a sense if others are having similar experiences and/or identify potential blind spots. This also helps other peers know they can come to you if they find themselves needing a friend!

Collaboration in crisis communication is vital. Consider: 1. Ensure all understand the plan through drills. 2. Involve legal, HR, and ops teams. 3. Clarify everyone's tasks. 4. Maintain strong networks. 5. Define escalation triggers. 6. Use AI for sentiment analysis. 7. Maintain a content library. 8. Develop a comprehensive guide. Successful crisis communication relies on teamwork, readiness, and adaptability. AI aids in analysis, but human collaboration and leadership are crucial.

Transparency is key! Be consistent in your messaging and be as honest as possible within crisis communication. Beating around the bush will lead to more questions whereas transparency will lead to trust.

Key points to consider for crisis planning: - take time to understand what would constitute a public/media crisis in your org v internal. They are different. - create a crisis comms plan - but like ‘Fight Club’, don’t call it a crisis plan! - never go more than 18 months without a crisis exercise/joint BCP test with media element. - make sure that you test in real-time using experts/crisis media former journalists and definitely test social media responses. - no crisis plan ‘survives contact with the enemy’ so be prepared that it won’t go the way you expect. Use/rehearse the crisis CARE messaging formula.