Do brands need Crisis prevention?

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Do brands need Crisis prevention, or is it an exaggeration?

Do brands need Crisis prevention?

When a crisis arises, you have maximum up to two hours to respond, acknolwedge, and tackle consequences. You are gotten on surprise, or at best, you are alerted by a morning media post that writes about your company. So, you are fully in reactive mode and a bit passive, waiting to see developments.

But your customers, partners, employees and other stakeholders would expect that you handle with confidence, a bit of grace and that you are on-top of things being an esteemed and well organized company of choice…for them all. What do they see? An empty/no-comment Facebook page, they google for developments and they ask around (word-of-mouth is still the most powerful communicaiton channel).

What do you do? You most probably write a reactive statement to gain time and meanwhile your agency partners are calling journalists, or their “network” trying to contain the story. But your company has already become a story…

The domino effect

Unprepared teams and orgnizations at best have some policies around (don’t answer the call, call the facility manager), but they can’t navigate the course of events. They don’t have a clear mind to do so. Every social media mention, every journalists’ call, every announcement intensifies the “who knows what happens next” anxiety.

The communication team looks like the savior of the day, but they are only humans. Even if they have handled a case before, being so accustomed to their daily routine, they can’t easily start assessing quality control, digital ordering systems, call center, and product managers to get to the core of the strongest company’s arguments. Reminder: time is against you in times of an escalating crisis.

So then, you have higher risks for the domino effect: one social media team’s answer is ridiculed; an annoyed citizen posts negative comments reshared hundreds of times; a wrong answer to request for information is copied wrongly; a leaked answer to the authorities finds its way to the big headline. The domino effect adds to the perceived wrongful practices of a company, and because it’s most of the times pure perception …perception becomes reality!

What does it mean to be proactive

Most companies rework -in various formats- their on-the-spot reactive message and they hope the story fades out. But proactivity is part of the manager’s role and job description. Every critical role in the company contributes daily to brand equity, as well as the trusted and quality perceptions for all audiences.

So why don’t they make up some time to prepare? Why don’t sit together as one (cross-departmental) team to turn their risk-based ISO certifications in actionable and evidence-based fast actions and convincing communication messages? Why do they risk of being seen as lousy, unprepared, arrogant, or “hiding something bigger” corporation? Why don’t they do what actually their role is: “raise, nurture, and protect a brand that serves customer needs and brings returns to shareholders and stakeholders“?

I honestly don’t know and I haven’t answered this after so many years working for brands and corporate crisis-response. It amazes me every time.

Proactivity needs fixing the organization’s gaps

When we do Crisis-ready programs we come across many gaps. Operations are not aligned with Marketing, Customer care, or Business Development. Customer complaints aren’t surfaced up the ladder. Factory and warehouse/logistics are not sharing their many challenges to the entire organization (is it a power-game of who’s a better manager?). Corporate affairs is fighting to fix relationships that are by default broken by the company’s very own operation, compliance misses and processes.

So when we audit the organization we try before all to bring them closer; share internally their feedback, questionnaires, and spot risks; we make truths be heard, so they all align and start realizing that it is primarily about them. A crisis-ready company has the right mindset and the right people who not only wish to be prepared but in order to do so, they start improving on managing proactively risks.

When they do so, the organization is ready for a transformation and change culture! The company can run successfully pieces of training and roadmaps, to make sure that no risk in the future can hurt its business continuity and perceptions. The very same perception they are paying so much every day through their communication efforts.

If you don’t choose to do it in leadership time up front, you do it in crisis management time down the road. – Stephen Covey

The No1 change catalyst is the CEO

The CEO has for sure a lot of challenges on his desk. Digital technologies firmly entrenched are changing the company’s business model. Tired or complacent employees are creating gaps of performance everyday. Young talent doesn’t know where to turn to for competence development (sometimes they learn by trial and error). New equipment, new products, new partnerships, new changes, new systems, new markets, new consumers…

The CEO is the only one who can direct change and make Crisis prevention part of the company’s milestones and plans. Visionary CEOs look the bigger picture. They don’t compromise on having simply a good reactive statement, because they know what can go wrong. They are few though. The majority prefers to sponsor and event and get awarded, than investing time and experience in being crisis-ready.

There are few managers in my professional life who took the intiative to work for and build a crisis-ready organization, influencing their peers, educating all reporting teams on how to improve and equip the organization. Some did it after a previous crisis they’ve experienced and some, fewer, looking at a risky new operation they were about to launch.

If your company is like many organizations, then there are great risks that may be leaving your brand unnecessarily exposed. Primarily, your own company operations. Customer service, product faults, regulation, health & safety, energy footprint, social contribution, network outages, failed delivery, security, data privacy, and financial aspects of what your company does. Everything can turn out to be a major crisis incident. Allegations, complaints, attacks, and negative stories on the media.

Companies will never again have control over perceptions

Communities are talking about companies, policies, experiences, prices, complains, and evaluate if you stand true to any brand promise. Consumers can become very cynical about flight attendants, bank cashiers, rude customer service staff in-shop while always compare competitors. Companies will never “control” or “direct” perceptions in the open, peer-to-peer economy. Have you ever really thought how big this change is? No more paid media or native (paid) content to “contain the story”.

CEOs, University Deans, Directors of Boards, Ministers, Team leaders must openly engage their communications team and be Crisis-ready – not when the story goes public.

Our team will be open to share more insights and stimuli for your own company’s preparedness, so don’t be shy, get in touch here!