The crisis management hall of fame is filled with companies and high-profile individuals who were responsible for creating disasters, scandals or other emergencies. There are also those who, when their organizations were the victims of a crisis, made matters worse by what they did or said — or failed to do and say.
After analyzing hundreds of different crisis situations, I’ve identified the five common mistakes that have created a crisis — or exacerbated it — and what corporate executives can do to avoid repeating those failures.
Denial: Leaders should not deny that a crisis could happen to their business, or that there’s no way to mitigate or lessen common crisis triggers such as allegations of sexual abuse. And don’t deny the possibility that employees could create a crisis because of their poor judgement, unethical or illegal behavior, and what they say or do on social media. Executives who refuse to believe that their businesses could ever be the victim of a crisis are in for a rude awakening when it does happen and won’t know what to do about it.
Delay: Leaders should not take too long to respond to a crisis or share their side of the story about the situation. The longer that executives wait to respond to a crisis, the worse things can get for their organizations. The same holds true for delays in communicating about the crisis. The silence can be filled by others and put a business on the defensive, which is never a good place to be in a crisis.
A Failure to Plan: Companies that do not have crisis management plans will be at an immediate disadvantage when a crisis strikes. When properly prepared, the plans will include important details such as what will trigger a crisis; who will do what in a crisis; when, where and how it will be done; what will be said about the situation; and who will say it. Without this basic information and guidance already in place, executives will waste valuable time figuring out how to respond to a crisis.
A Failure to Test: Unless businesses test their plans on a regular basis, they will have no idea if they will work when needed, or how the plans should be strengthened and improved. The plans can be tested several ways, including tabletop exercises and computer simulations. The exercises are excellent opportunities to ensure that the plans reflect the latest risks or threats that could cause a crisis. Having plans and not testing them to make sure they will work is not much different from having no plans at all.
A Failure to Appoint Teams:
Companies should appoint members of their crisis management teams before they are needed in a crisis. Otherwise, executives will find themselves scrambling to figure out who will manage their organization’s response to an unfolding situation. Teams that are assembled ahead of time will have opportunities when the plans are tested to determine whether they can work well together under deadlines and pressure.
Business leaders should not be surprised if they are blindsided during a crisis. Just ask Andy Byron, the then-CEO of Astronomer. Soon after a video went viral of him embracing a woman who was not his wife at a Coldplay concert in July, someone posted on social media an apology claiming to be from him. But Byron did not make the apology or authorize anyone to do it on his behalf. Astronomer issued a statement to set the record straight about the fake apology.
Companies need to have rapid response policies and procedures in place to ensure that when something false, inaccurate or misleading is said about their crisis, they can immediately respond with the correct information. All appropriate and available communication channels and methods should be used to help get the word out with the organization’s response. Otherwise, the falsehoods or inaccuracies will live on and can become conventional wisdom.
As soon as a crisis is over, organizations should immediately take steps to help rebuild trust in their companies. That includes keeping stakeholders informed about what is being done to recover from the situation, being available to answer any questions or concerns about how the crisis affected the company, and sharing details about how the business would prevent or mitigate a similar crisis in the future.
Going forward, executives should study and learn from the crisis management successes and failures of other companies that are in the news and do what they can to repeat the successes—and avoid the mistakes.
Edward Segal is a crisis management expert, consultant, podcast host and author of The Crisis Casebook: Lessons in Crisis Management from the World’s Leading Brands. He offers a free crisis management plan template on his website.
