Crisis Communication (Ndela, 2019)
Introduction
In the era of crisis
Crisis have become an inevitable and permanent feature of modern society.
Some crises are solved behind the organization's closed doors, while others
are thrust into the limelight, thereby upsetting an organization's image,
reputation and relationship with its stakeholders.
The environment of organizations is today fraught with high levels of risks.
The most obvious area of vulnerability is in social media, which enables
disgruntled stakeholders to air their grievances against an organization.
In an era of instantaneous communications and social networking, crisis news
travels faster than ever before, making breaking news in international media
channels, and viral feeds on social media platforms. New communications
technologies make the world smaller and closer, and this enhances the
visibility of many crises.
We are becoming more and more aware of risks and vulnerabilities in our
societies because of images and stories of crises in the media.
Becks Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity: captures the increased risk in
today's society, a situation that organizations cannot avoid. The risk society
describes how new risks created by science and social changes have partly
overshadowed the old natural disasters like pests etc.
Becks World at Risk: Globalization of Risk: changes from risk society to global
risk society. It is no longer tied to a particular place, time or group of people.
Perrow in Normal Accidents: Living with High-Risk Technologies: as our
technology increases, wars increase, and when we invade nature more and
more, we create systems—organizations and organization of organizations—
that increase risks for operators, passengers and innocent bystanders. Some
high-risk systems have some special characteristics that make accidents
unavoidable and normal, because they are unavoidable, unpredictable and
unstoppable.
Awareness is the beginning of the journey in crisis prevention, preparedness
and eventual management. Communication is a central component of this
journey
Defining organizational crisis
Due to a wide field of application, there are no clear boundaries as to what
constitutes a crisis or not. Some crises are clearly visible, while others are
invisible or are based on contested perceptions, such as certain forms of
organizational crises like misdeeds.
Bland: There is no clearly definable point at which we can say that a minor
problem has become an official crisis. One has to exercise a balance of
judgement at the earliest stages and according to Bland, it is this judgement
that distinguishes between good and bad crisis management. Bland argues
that it is best to have a low threshold when defining crisis, and take even
small episodes as potential big threats and at least be prepared for an
incident to escalate into a crisis.
, Freeman's Stakeholder definition: any group or individual who is affected by
or can affect the achievement of an organization's objective
Flink: an organizational crisis is a situation that can potentially escalate in
intensity, fall under close government or media scrutiny, jeopardize the
current positive public image of an organization or interfere with normal
business operations.
Pearson and mitroff: an organizational crisis is an incident or event that poses
a threat to an organization's reputation and viability
Coombs: A crisis is the perception of an unpredictable event that threatens
important expectancies of stakeholders related to health, safety,
environmental, and economic issues, and can seriously impact an
organization’s performance and generate negative outcome
Bland: A crisis is not what has happened, it is what people think has
happened.
Stakeholders are therefore central to the understanding and definition of
some crises.
Characteristics of Organizational crisis
Three characteristics separating crises from other unpleasant situations:
o Threat: threatens the high-priority values of an organization
o Surprise: is unexpected or unanticipated
o Short response time: presents a restricted in which to respond
According to Hermann, managers must
o Recognize a threat and believe it will hinder high-priority goals
o Recognize he irreparableness and degeneration of a situation if they
take no action
o Must be ready to face surprises
Hermann: a crisis threatens high-priority values of an organization, presents a
restricted amount of time in which a response can be made, and is
unexpected or unanticipated by an organization.
Lerbinger identifies three characteristics of crisis:
o Suddenness (even though the antecedent signs are almost always
present)
o Uncertainty (revolves around questions of cause, blame, response,
public perception, resolution and consequences).
o Time compression (decisions must be made under stress)
Gregory: crises are
o high consequence,
o low probability,
o overlaid with risk and uncertainty,
o conducted under time pressure,
o disruptive,
o of normal business and potentially lethal to organization reputation.
Pearson & Mitroff: organizational crises have the following dimensions:
o they are highly visible,
o contain an element of surprise,
o require action and are outside an organization's complete control.
,Crisis typologies
Different types of crisis classifications per researcher
Crises can also be categorized according to the tempo of progression,
as sudden or smouldering crises.
o Sudden: occur suddenly, without warning and go beyond an
organization’s control. Like unplanned, unexpected and undersigned
events
o Smouldering: those crises that are slow-moving and not clearly visible.
Situations like government regulation actions, consumer activism,
rumors, bribery
SSCT (Situational crisis communication theory): Three clusters of crises
o Victim cluster
Relates to those crisis types where an organization has not
caused the crisis but is itself also a victim
o Accidental cluster
Crises where organizational actions leading to the crisis were
unintentional, for example technical breakdowns or failures.
o Preventable cluster
Crises where an organization’s inappropriate actions led to the
crisis.
o The assumption in SCCT is that crises in the same cluster will have
underlying similarities, which allows crisis managers to have one crisis
plan that can be applied to a group of crises.
,
It should be noted that one crises can have elements cutting across
categories.
Crisis management: a strategic process
Research in crisis management shows a paradigm shift in perspective, from a
narrow focus to a broader and more proactive perspective.
Shrivastava: crisis is not an event, but rather a process extended in time and
place.
Mitroff & Anagnos: crisis management is broader than dealing with a crisis
alone. Modern crisis management encompasses management strategies
designed to anticipate crises, prevent them from happening and manage
them effectively once they have occurred, minimize the damage to an
organization and its stakeholders and provide valuable lessons for future
management processes.
The crisis management process is divided in three phases:
o Pre-crisis
o Crisis response
o Post-crisis management
Jaques proposed a non-linear, relational construct which considers issue and
crisis management in the context of interdependent activities and clusters of
activity that must be managed at different stages. This model presents four
major phases in crisis management, with each building a cluster of activities:
o Crisis preparedness
o Crisis prevention
o Crisis incident management
o Post-crisis management
Introduction
In the era of crisis
Crisis have become an inevitable and permanent feature of modern society.
Some crises are solved behind the organization's closed doors, while others
are thrust into the limelight, thereby upsetting an organization's image,
reputation and relationship with its stakeholders.
The environment of organizations is today fraught with high levels of risks.
The most obvious area of vulnerability is in social media, which enables
disgruntled stakeholders to air their grievances against an organization.
In an era of instantaneous communications and social networking, crisis news
travels faster than ever before, making breaking news in international media
channels, and viral feeds on social media platforms. New communications
technologies make the world smaller and closer, and this enhances the
visibility of many crises.
We are becoming more and more aware of risks and vulnerabilities in our
societies because of images and stories of crises in the media.
Becks Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity: captures the increased risk in
today's society, a situation that organizations cannot avoid. The risk society
describes how new risks created by science and social changes have partly
overshadowed the old natural disasters like pests etc.
Becks World at Risk: Globalization of Risk: changes from risk society to global
risk society. It is no longer tied to a particular place, time or group of people.
Perrow in Normal Accidents: Living with High-Risk Technologies: as our
technology increases, wars increase, and when we invade nature more and
more, we create systems—organizations and organization of organizations—
that increase risks for operators, passengers and innocent bystanders. Some
high-risk systems have some special characteristics that make accidents
unavoidable and normal, because they are unavoidable, unpredictable and
unstoppable.
Awareness is the beginning of the journey in crisis prevention, preparedness
and eventual management. Communication is a central component of this
journey
Defining organizational crisis
Due to a wide field of application, there are no clear boundaries as to what
constitutes a crisis or not. Some crises are clearly visible, while others are
invisible or are based on contested perceptions, such as certain forms of
organizational crises like misdeeds.
Bland: There is no clearly definable point at which we can say that a minor
problem has become an official crisis. One has to exercise a balance of
judgement at the earliest stages and according to Bland, it is this judgement
that distinguishes between good and bad crisis management. Bland argues
that it is best to have a low threshold when defining crisis, and take even
small episodes as potential big threats and at least be prepared for an
incident to escalate into a crisis.
, Freeman's Stakeholder definition: any group or individual who is affected by
or can affect the achievement of an organization's objective
Flink: an organizational crisis is a situation that can potentially escalate in
intensity, fall under close government or media scrutiny, jeopardize the
current positive public image of an organization or interfere with normal
business operations.
Pearson and mitroff: an organizational crisis is an incident or event that poses
a threat to an organization's reputation and viability
Coombs: A crisis is the perception of an unpredictable event that threatens
important expectancies of stakeholders related to health, safety,
environmental, and economic issues, and can seriously impact an
organization’s performance and generate negative outcome
Bland: A crisis is not what has happened, it is what people think has
happened.
Stakeholders are therefore central to the understanding and definition of
some crises.
Characteristics of Organizational crisis
Three characteristics separating crises from other unpleasant situations:
o Threat: threatens the high-priority values of an organization
o Surprise: is unexpected or unanticipated
o Short response time: presents a restricted in which to respond
According to Hermann, managers must
o Recognize a threat and believe it will hinder high-priority goals
o Recognize he irreparableness and degeneration of a situation if they
take no action
o Must be ready to face surprises
Hermann: a crisis threatens high-priority values of an organization, presents a
restricted amount of time in which a response can be made, and is
unexpected or unanticipated by an organization.
Lerbinger identifies three characteristics of crisis:
o Suddenness (even though the antecedent signs are almost always
present)
o Uncertainty (revolves around questions of cause, blame, response,
public perception, resolution and consequences).
o Time compression (decisions must be made under stress)
Gregory: crises are
o high consequence,
o low probability,
o overlaid with risk and uncertainty,
o conducted under time pressure,
o disruptive,
o of normal business and potentially lethal to organization reputation.
Pearson & Mitroff: organizational crises have the following dimensions:
o they are highly visible,
o contain an element of surprise,
o require action and are outside an organization's complete control.
,Crisis typologies
Different types of crisis classifications per researcher
Crises can also be categorized according to the tempo of progression,
as sudden or smouldering crises.
o Sudden: occur suddenly, without warning and go beyond an
organization’s control. Like unplanned, unexpected and undersigned
events
o Smouldering: those crises that are slow-moving and not clearly visible.
Situations like government regulation actions, consumer activism,
rumors, bribery
SSCT (Situational crisis communication theory): Three clusters of crises
o Victim cluster
Relates to those crisis types where an organization has not
caused the crisis but is itself also a victim
o Accidental cluster
Crises where organizational actions leading to the crisis were
unintentional, for example technical breakdowns or failures.
o Preventable cluster
Crises where an organization’s inappropriate actions led to the
crisis.
o The assumption in SCCT is that crises in the same cluster will have
underlying similarities, which allows crisis managers to have one crisis
plan that can be applied to a group of crises.
,
It should be noted that one crises can have elements cutting across
categories.
Crisis management: a strategic process
Research in crisis management shows a paradigm shift in perspective, from a
narrow focus to a broader and more proactive perspective.
Shrivastava: crisis is not an event, but rather a process extended in time and
place.
Mitroff & Anagnos: crisis management is broader than dealing with a crisis
alone. Modern crisis management encompasses management strategies
designed to anticipate crises, prevent them from happening and manage
them effectively once they have occurred, minimize the damage to an
organization and its stakeholders and provide valuable lessons for future
management processes.
The crisis management process is divided in three phases:
o Pre-crisis
o Crisis response
o Post-crisis management
Jaques proposed a non-linear, relational construct which considers issue and
crisis management in the context of interdependent activities and clusters of
activity that must be managed at different stages. This model presents four
major phases in crisis management, with each building a cluster of activities:
o Crisis preparedness
o Crisis prevention
o Crisis incident management
o Post-crisis management
