You're facing an unexpected PR crisis. How do you quickly adapt your communication strategy?

Listen. When faced with a crisis it's tempting to jump to conclusions and respond before you've fully processed the situation. But a PR crisis is a vote of no-confidence from your key stakeholders. To win them back over, you must genuinely listen to them, critically self-reflect, recalibrate your compass, and only then seek to respond authentically. Speed can be a liability rather than an asset. Don't let it be.

When an unexpected PR crisis hits, quickly adapting your communication strategy is crucial to managing the situation effectively. Transparency is key. Acknowledge the crisis as soon as possible to show that you are aware and not trying to hide it. Express empathy for those affected, and quickly collect all relevant facts about the situation and verify their accuracy. Keep updating the facts as new information becomes available.

In my experience handling PR crises, the key to quick adaptation is balancing transparency with strategic control. For instance, you can set up a live FAQ section on your website to address ongoing questions and update stakeholders regularly. This approach not only keeps the narrative consistent but also builts trust through clear, real-time updates. Additionally, where possible, engaging directly with key stakeholders and addressing their concerns in personal calls can make a significant difference in rebuilding relationships.

Respond from a place of responsibility and admit fault immediately. By being transparent about the public relations crisis, organizations are simultaneously rebuilding trust from the public. However, companies will lose customers and public approval the longer they remain silent. Everyone loves a comeback and organizations should realize the public is more forgiving than realized. The key to remember is to stay transparent when navigating the public relations storm.

Unless one has a magic wand, fully controlling the narrative is nearly impossible. It is however imperative that everyone who publically (and even off the record) speaks to the same agreed narrative. Quite literally sticking to the script is important. Noise needs to be minimized. The narrative is also fluid, as the situation evolves, so does the narrative - ideally not making a 180 degree turn but rather building on it with new information. Providing a single source of truth, such as a dedicated website section and clearly establishing the authorized sources can help. Honesty, speed, and integrity are key to succesful comms in such situations.

Analyze the scale and magnitude of the issue prior to any response. It's good to evaluate and weigh the value of a response and it's outcomes against the risk. Being factual, concise and brief in your response, ensuring input from relevant functions. For assessing, you will need to monitor the issue to see how the situation escalates or develops, analyze sentiment, key topics of conversations amongst stakeholders, and traction, and tailor make your response to address concerns. Never engage in topics relating to religion or politics or beliefs which can trigger emotions and negative reactions, meanwhile ensure consistency in all communications and one unified voice.

Activate. Reference. Activate your team, review the issue at hand, brief internal stakeholders on the crisis and initial thoughts, reference your crisis communications plan/playbook that you've built. Review the scenario map if you have those sketched. Ensure your internal team is clear on roles, and response/spokesperson. Move swiftly with the identified crisis response team, work smart, and with transparency, to your key stakeholders (internal and external). Meet hourly, daily, & weekly, as you navigate the crisis with the team and internal constituents, partners, etc. to manage your communications (written and verbal) with clarity and action. As with all things, debrief. Debrief on key learnings, action and assessment.