crisis management

immediacy and visibility in crisis management part 3

when disaster strikes a company and it turns into crisis management mode, for families of the victims, the prevailing sentiment is hurt, sorrow and hunger for relief and an insatiable hunger for information for the victims of the families involved in the disaster like what happened to sulpicio lines (princess of the stars), abs-cbn (wowowee) and ayala land (glorieta explosion).

the general public will automatically give their sympathy to the families of the victims of the disaster. the overwhelming feeling will be "awa" (pity) and to some degree fear as it reminds them that no one is safe, that they too or a family member could have become a victim. they will search for sympathy points, completely hungry to gorge on more information on the disaster and what the families of victims have to say about it.

media is on heightened alert, it's a scoop mentality where they go into full coverage and will pry into every angle. they will send teams of news reporters to look at all angles all at the same time and will try to get them as soon as possible. aside from making sure they have full round the clock coverage of the location of the disaster, they will send teams to look into possible issues elsewhere that they can feature in the near future. they will not only look at the present, they will look into what they will print in the next few days and weeks.

it is this forward thinking and the scoop mentality that will get them a bigger audience in the future. the present events will get the same coverage from all media competitors, they will not stand out. what will make a media outlet stand out is the angle that they will be investigating now that their competitive media outlets have not seen.

the law enforcers, politicians, government officials and government regulators will also step into the picture. they are drawn into it not only because they are ultimately responsible for the safety and security of its citizens, they are also attracted to the magnetic power of media exposure, hopefully for better and not for worst.

in all of the above, and this is the most immediate time from the disaster, perhaps within the next five to seven days, blame and legal accountability is the farthest thing from their minds. it is some kind of relief from the pain that is most needed. and reassurance from someone or some group is there for them is much more important and of course information and facts.

the families of the victims are the most important in this time frame.

more on this in WAWAM! next........

immediacy and visibility in crisis management : part 2

immediacy and visibility is probably the most important of all good practices of crisis management. it is the first thing you need to deliver on and the first thing you need to be best at.

crisis like what the companies mentioned are very public ones and they almost always take a life of their own and that life begins one second after it has occurred. in tragedies where the loss of life and damage to property are concerned, the victims and their families are in it the moment it occurred. media follows right after while the general public gets sucked into it.

being there immediately and in a very visible way paints a good picture of corporate responsibility and caring. this needs to be separated from "guilt" and that is where i think many uninitiated companies on crisis management fail in. they incorrectly view immediacy and visibility as an admission of guilt, making them pull back and become tentative in their actions. it is in fact quite the opposite - slow response and scarce visibility breeds suspicion of guilt and wrong doing.


more on this in WAWAM!.....

Ayala Land, Meralco, Sulpicio Lines, ABS-CBN - what they have in common

yes, we have to admit it, that list of companies is a very strange one. the first reaction is probably this - no way is there something common among all those companies.

well, there is one - crisis. actually there are two - crisis management is the other one. all the companies listed above has gone through some kind of crisis. different ones but a crisis just the same. of interest to us is also the kind of crisis management practices they applied when crisis hit their companies.

ayala land got hit by the explosion in the their most important property, the glorietta mall. nobody imagined that such an explosion can occur in a mall and this is not just an ordinary mall, it's an ayala mall. over the years, ayala malls have built a very strong reputation of high quality and invincibility. the explosion also occurred at a time when there was some political noise in the country that most people concluded this was a terrorist attack.


the explosion happened on a work day and within a very short period of time the press was on site with live cameras and even helicopter aerial shots of the damage to the mall.

ayala land's crisis management response was impeccable - within minutes of the explosion, they had an officer of the company, most probably from their public relations group, in the site talking to the press. of course the ayala land spokesman had no information to share since the explosion just occurred minutes ago, but the important thing was an officer of the company was actually on site and giving the views of the management of the mall. he talked to the press in a very calm and professional manner and was very candid in admitting he did not have of details about what happened. he was also re-assuring the public and the press that ayala management is concerned and is on top of things. ayala land was not hiding, they were actually on site and being very involved.

immediacy and visibility is one of the most important good practices of crisis management.




more on this in WAWAM!.....