Crisis Communication: Explanation and Process

Crisis Communication Explanation and Process

In order to understand crisis communication as a whole concept, it is important to grasp the concept of crisis and communication separately. A crisis is an event or sequence of unwanted events which take place at the workplace. It creates disturbance as well as unrest among the individuals. Generally, a crisis arises all of a sudden or on short notice and it triggers a sense of fear and a threat among the individuals. The crisis causes severe harm to the individuals along with the organization. Those who sense the upcoming crisis are called crisis communicators and the process through which they sense it is called crisis communication. To add to this, these individuals help the organization to come out of tough and difficult situations in the quickest as well as the best possible way.

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The Concept of Crisis Communication

The term crisis communication can be defined as a special wing that helps in dealing with the reputation of the organization as well as the employees. It is an initiative that helps in protecting and maintaining the reputation of the organization. It is also used to maintain and improve the organization’s public image. There are several factors that significantly affect the image in addition to the reputation of the organization such as investigations by the government, criminal attacks, and media inquiry.  

Thus, crisis communication helps in clarifying things to the public and hence enhances the reputation of the organization in the eyes of the people. Considering the impact and consequences of the crisis on the organization, the organization employs experts to deal with the crisis. The experts are employed by the organization to save the reputation of the organization against several unwanted challenges and threats.

Therefore, the main purpose of the experts employed by the organization is to brand identity of the organization while maintaining the firm standing of the organization within the industry.

How does a Crisis Communication (CC) Team Look Like?

The crisis communication (CC) team is in charge of gathering information, developing and delivering critical messages, and coordinating with the media. The team also oversees crisis response and crisis communication. 

Composition of CC Team

This team is critical for determining what steps should be taken, and it should include persons who are critical to the situation.

The following people may be on the crisis communication team:

  • Chief Executive Officer (CEO)
  • Head of Public Relations (PR) function
  • Vice Presidents (VP) or Directors of key functions
  • Functional managers
  • Safety or Security Officer
  • Legal Counsel
  • A senior manager from the division in charge of the area engaged in the circumstance that caused the crisis.
  • Any eyewitnesses or anybody who may be able to provide light on the incident

It is important to note that this structure is typically part of the crisis management (CM) team, as the crisis communication team functions as a sub-team of the CM team.

Students do realize how important it is to have a practical sense of crisis that occurs in organizations and they being prospective employees, what would be their role in communicating the same at the earliest and in such a way that the crisis can be handled and solved at the earliest. To have such ideas, throughout their course of management, PR, or communication, they are assigned various types of assignments that can sharpen their skills. Again, with much pressure or other academic work, it becomes difficult often for students to finish all those critical assignments on time and submit them to attain good course credits. To solve this issue, students can avail of college assignment help services and score high grades. Professional writers of the assignment help company will complete assignment in such a way that just by going through it, students will easily understand how to solve the crisis.

Types of Crisis Within the Organization

There are five major types of crises that significantly can affect the functioning of the organization. It is important to identify the type of crisis in order to deal with the crisis in an effective manner.

Types of organizational crisis

Take a look at the different types of crisis that companies come across with:

Financial crisis:

An organization is said to be in a financial crisis when it loses value in its assets. In the financial crisis, the organization cannot afford to pay off its expenses. The financial crisis is caused by either external or internal factors which result in an extensive decrease in demand for the product and services of the organization.

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Personnel crisis:

An organization is said to be in a personnel crisis when an internal and key stakeholder of the organization is involved in an unethical scandal or illegal activity that can impact the reputation of the organization.

Organization crisis:

An organization is said to be in an organizational crisis when the organization exploits its potential customers in order to gain more information or profits.

Technological crisis:

A technological crisis within an organization occurs when the technology of the organization crashes. For example, when an error emerges or a server breaks in a software product. Due to this crisis, the users of the organization have no access to the products or services of the organization.

Natural crisis:

An organization is said to be in a natural crisis when the functioning of the organization is interrupted by severe weather. The natural crisis can be temporary such as snow delay or flooding evacuation. It is very tough to avoid such type of crisis and hence the organization should have a contingency plan to reduce the impact of the natural crisis on the functioning of the organization.

Different types of crises will require people from different roles to take a look into them. Therefore, a company must have skilled employees and systems in place to deal with such crisis when they crop up and can be solved at the earliest.

Organizations expect that such crises will be sensed, dealt and mitigated very quickly as well as swiftly. To be able to do so, employees working in such organizations that have higher chances of crises must be alert all the time. They also need to have a crystal-clear understanding of the workflow of the organization and often fathom upcoming issues. Only and only having a great sense of the entire crisis communication can help them do their job effectively in their higher studies. Taking risk management assignment help can be a great option to make the most of the reading as the expert management professionals can work on students’ assignment papers while they can focus entirely on reading and expanding their knowledge on crisis communication.

Strategies to Deal with the Crisis at the Workplace

The organization should develop a set of strategies in order to deal with the crisis in the workplace. The strategies should be implemented either in order to eliminate the crisis or reduce the impact of the crisis on the organization.

The following are the strategies that will be helpful in dealing with the crisis:

Anticipate crisis

It is very important for the organization to be proactive in order to protect the organization from the crisis. In order to anticipate the crisis, the organization should develop a team and conduct intensive brainstorming sessions on the potential crisis that can occur within the organization. It will help the organization to realize the situation and the organization can easily develop effective steps to prevent the crisis.

Develop a crisis communication team

The organization should develop a team within the organization that can communicate with the key stakeholders at the time of crisis. The team should be able to anticipate the possible crisis within the organization. The top management of the organization should lead the team.

Identify and train spokespersons

The organization should ensure that only authorized spokespersons speak for the critical situation. The organization should develop appropriate policies as well as a training program in order to train the spokespersons. There should be a team of spokespersons so that at the time of need they can backup spokespersons for different channels of communication.

Monitoring properly

The organization should establish notification along with monitoring systems: nowadays, it is very important to have a system with the help of which the concerned authority can reach the internal and external stakeholders of the organization immediately. Establishing a notification as well as a monitoring system helps in reaching the key stakeholders on an immediate basis.

Apart from this, the organization should identify its stakeholders also develop holding statements. Moreover, the organization should assess the crisis situation. After that, the message should be finalized and adapted. It will help in avoiding crisis and if a crisis occurs the organization can easily reduce the impact.

Importance of Crisis Communication

An organization should develop a team to deal with the crisis. Crisis communication helps the organization significantly and makes the organization capable of dealing with the crisis effectively and efficiently.

Here are some important points which highlight the importance of communication at the time of crisis within the organization:

Provide protection

It helps the organization in protecting as well as maintaining the reputation of the organization in the public. A crisis significantly affects the reputation of the organization. Therefore, to protect the reputation of the organization, effective communication at the time of crisis is necessary. Thus, crisis communication helps protect and maintain the organization’s reputation in the eyes of the public.

Performance maintenance

With the help of effective communication in times of crisis helps the organization maintain its performance of the organization. If the organization does not manage the crisis effectively, it will affect the performance of the employees significantly and hence with the passage of time, the performance of the overall organization will reduce significantly. Thus, crisis communication helps in maintaining the performance of the organization.

Helps in maintaining the company/brand identity

Effective communication at the time of crisis helps the organization to protect the brand identity of the organization. Brand identity is very significant for the success of the product and service of the organization.

Preserves employee motivation and more at the bad times

Crisis communication helps ensure a high level of employee motivation and morale in the organization. A high level of employee motivation and morale ensures a high level of performance and productivity.

Designated employees within the organization who are hit hard by any crisis work hard to overcome tough situations. They help the organization come out of the tough and difficult situations in the quickest and best possible way. They respond to the crisis with the help of strategic strategy and try to mitigate the crisis or reduce the impact of the crisis within the organization.

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Conclusion

Crisis communication helps in clarifying concerns to the stakeholders and public and hence enhances the reputation of the organization in the eyes of the people. Considering the impact and consequences of the crisis on the organization, the organization employs experts to deal with the crisis. These experts work to save the reputation of the organization against several unwanted challenges as well as threats. One of the most important assets of the organization is its brand identity. Thus, the main purpose of the experts employed by the organization is to establish the brand identity of the organization as well as maintain its firm standing within the industry.

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