Crisis management

OK, so I missed the class this week, but I have been doing a bit of reading about crisis management, so that's OK. Actually I've been reading about issues management, which is similar, except that you should be able to see it coming. The book I've been reading has the sexy title of Strategic Issues Management. Here is a picture of the cover:


Slinky no? The author argues that most crises are actually issues that an organisation has failed to address which, if the case studies in my corporate communications class are anything to go by, is a view borne out by reality. Krysten's talk on the remarkable implosion of Peanut Corporation of America has stuck in my head as a case of a business is unwilling to look further than the end of its nose. I am reminded of Seymour and Moore who talks of "cobra" problems, which strike rapidly and without warning, and "python" problems which slowly strangle the life out of you. Just how many of the crises facing organisations could have been averted by proper planning and risk management?


Nonetheless, real and unavoidable crises do happen, and business contingencies have to be made. The first rule is to have a crisis team ready to be committed to the problem - I've been in offices when crises hit, and the havoc they can wreak on management is unreal. The second is to act decisively, partly because the problem needs to get sorted, and partly because people are judging you according to how swiftly you deal with it. The third, from the point of view of communications, is to accept that the press want a story and to give them one: Why did it happen? Who is responsible? What are you doing about it? How do we know this isn't going to happen again?

I'd like to read more about the use of resignations in the wake of a crisis - can anyone recommend any literature on the subject? From the point of view of the onlooker, there's something comfortingly wholesome and genuine about resignations. Nothing says "I'm sorry" quite like spot of early retirement. I for one would like to see more of it.

Google vs PRS

Youtube have taken down thousands of music videos from their site. The move is part of a licensing spat between Google, who run the video streaming website Youtube and the Performing Rights Society (PRS), which collects royalties for musicians. Google claim that the licensing terms proposed by PRS are prohibitively expensive, and would lead to a financial loss every time a video is played.


Understandably the move has created quite a buzz across the internet. Youtube is a staple of the contemporary online experience, and a move like this is guaranteed a huge amount of public attention.

My feelings are that the dramatic and wholesale removal of music videos by major artists is not just a strongarm negotiating tactic, but a calculated public relations move. Google is well aware that widespread loyalty to its brand will motivate public opinion against PRS, and it is has every interest in dragging this tiff into the public sphere. The PRS on the other hand has received bad press recently for demanding license fees from all manner of unlikely and inappropriate venues, (including police stations and workplaces) and is unlikely to receive much sympathy, especially among internet users who have become accustomed to obtaining free music. That Google are appealling to the court of public opinion is made clear by their reference to the Arctic Monkeys, a wildly popular band which rose to prominence through social media sites.

It is an increasingly common opinion that the music industry needs to be rethought, and that the regime run by the PRS is symbolic of a business model who's time has passed. This fallout gives real life form to that debate, and for that reason it will be interesting to see how it pans out. A cultural gulf lies between both sides, and it is the role of communications professionals to bring these differences to the fore.

In particular both sides assign different cultural meaning to Youtube. For PRS, Youtube music videos are an end in themselves. For the vast majority of Youtube users however, Youtube music videos are simply marketing tools, too low quality to be comparable to the final product. The assertion is that while hearing music should be free, music which warrants ownership will be bought. Indeed a comment on the Guardian website suggested that music companies should be paying Youtube for advertising space.

Ryanair wage war on blogosphere

Just had this article brought to my attention. It concerns Ryanair's approach to a blogger's comment about their website. It's a good story because it contains a sort of double reveal.

First theres the ridiculously pumped up Ryanair IT technician, who swoops on the post, accuses the blogger of being "an idiot and a liar", proceeds to attack his web development credentials and finally produces some weird semi-threat (see picture) which centres around giving away a million free Ryanair flights.


Undiplomatic backoffice staff member starts slinging insults around on the blogosphere; this is where you'd expect the comms department to wade in, issuing some sort of humble apology to quell the impending swell of blogo-rage. Right?

Wrong. In a statement released to Travalution a spokesperson for Ryanair said:

Ryanair can confirm that a Ryanair staff member did engage in a blog discussion. It is Ryanair policy not to waste time and energy corresponding with idiot bloggers and Ryanair can confirm that it won't be happening again.

Lunatic bloggers can have the blog sphere all to themselves as our people are far too busy driving down the cost of air travel.

So theres our second reveal - Ryanair do actually hate bloggers. Naturally, elements within the blogosphere have taken exception, calling Ryanair's statement "woeful", and threatening never to fly with the airline again. But despite the limited ire caused by Ryanair's statement, I don't think it is the worst thing the company could have said.



At least they're crystal clear about their online strategy. A large number of neo-PR types would balk at the idea of taking on the internet in a PR war. But I don't think its so desperately crazy to conceive of a communications approach that not only attempts to isolate the inhabitants of the blogosphere (see picture above), but resolves to take a dump on them as well. Research has shown that bloggers are not trusted (except by other bloggers). They have a reputation as self absorbed timewasters and it is beyond debate that the 'blogosphere' contains some of the most pointless fluff ever committed to type.

Whereas some businesses might have a lot to gain from getting into bed with these self appointed guardians of the internet, many might just as reasonably conclude that associating with bloggers is so counterproductive that the best strategy is to ignore them or, should they get narky with you or your staff, sling faeces from a distance.

I think Ryanair have judged their target market well. As a customer looking for a cheap flight, I would indeed prefer that Ryanair staff were "driving down the cost of air travel" (whatever that physically involves) than taking part in virtual love-ins on wordpress, blogger and the like. I'd take comfort in Ryanair's focus and their everyman contempt for the loudmouth internet nobody.

But while I've got some admiration for the sentiment of the release, I do feel it could have been written a bit more better. Comms staff really needed to offset the clumsy beligerence of the original blog postings, and I'm not sure they managed to do that. Words like "idiot" are a bit harsh to be used in a press release. "Lunatic" I quite like though. Even though it masks hundreds of years of mistreatment of the mentally ill, I'd generally consider it an affectionate term and one with considerable PR purchase.

Meanderings on the subject of corporate ethics II

OK, so I asked Adam Garfunkel whether my fictional boardroom exists anywhere, and he was diplomatic in his response. His answer went something like, sure people are well motivated, even in boardrooms, but ultimately CSR initiatives have to make business sense. This, I suppose should be self evident, unless obviously you're a tambourine weilding idealist like myself.

Luckily he was pretty good at convincing me that at least a lot of the time CSR initiatives do make business sense. CSR, he explained, is about risk management. Increasingly, companies are conducting their business in public, improved means of communication making it easier to notice poor practice. Companies should avoid future scandal by looking long and hard at what they are doing, and putting it right if it offers any cause for concern.


Although this seemed to make fine sense (it always does at the time), I've been considering the extent to which the logic tied to market conditions. What if people don't care where their slacks are being manufactured? What if people who patronise your business are indifferent to ethics? What if people are distracted from ethical considerations by other imperatives? The current financial environment seems less conducive to ethical scrutiny than the boom which preceeded it. Businesses have also dropped the amount they're donating to charity.

I suppose the failsafe should be the law, which we imagine is creeping (very slowly) in the direction of making business acknowledge and seek to limit its impacts. In principle, a business would do well to make a gradual transition to more sustainable operations, rather than getting into some ruckus with a regulator. Unfortunately, law makers (at least in this country) seem to be doing very little to make things uncomfortable for unsustainable businesses, and this has also been compounded by the economy. It would be a great shame to see emergent business values like transparency and social responsibility going under before they've had a chance to make an impact.

Meanderings on the subject of corporate ethics

A couple of weeks ago I took part in a class debate. Our team opposed the motion that you could only practise ethical PR in the not for profit sector, not with little difficulty. Especially ferocious was the attack from my classmate Saema, who argued that business simply can't be ethical, on the basis that they must, first and formost, cater to their shareholders. This view holds that corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a sham, and that ethics simply cannot exist in the boardroom.


Sadly I've never sat in a boardroom, at least not with board of directors, so I can only imagine (see above for my rather tragic graphical rendering of ethics in the boardroom). However, I 'm lothe to belive that every single one of them would be operating without a moral compass of any description. Presumedly these leaders of business would all be pariahs by now had they not, in general, abided by the ethical codes which define individual ethical conduct. Why should they as broadly moral people, who have probably wrestled with a dilemma or two, not be allowed to take a step back to examine and adjust the ethical direction of their organisation - the way that its vision and strategy work towards the (admittedly fairly vague) ideal of a good society?

Maybe people are right that as long as shareholders are there to be sated, and a profit seeking imperative remains enshrined in law, this ideal will never be acheived.

Or maybe it is in fact the case that for certain kinds of company, not only are conditions like sustainability and ethical agreeability becoming bound to profit, but also shareholders can be persuaded of this with greater ease. I reckon you can have a company that is both financially strong and actively ethical. What do you think?

The Thick of It

Some of my classmates will have heard me talking about "The Thick of It", a satirical comedy about British government. One of the main characters is a press officer who is obviously based on a well known public figure.

As our last seminar was about political PR, I thought it timely to link to a clip of the show for your enjoyment and eduction. While it is very funny (alongside making a serious observation about the impact of spin on the running of government) I should warn that in the name of realism it contains a bit of creative swearing.

New Media: Is PR getting left behind?

When I was working for my last employer (a local authority for a major UK city), my colleague made an educational film for local schools, tackling an issue she was working on. While she wanted to put the film on Youtube, Corporate Communications insisted that she could only do so with viewer comments disabled. She proceeded as instructed, and for a while we heard nothing.

Some days later however, the video was picked up by a local MP. Dismayed at the restrictions imposed on it, he had reuploaded the videos, this time with comments enabled. My collegue found that people were viewing (and commenting on) his version of the video, and took this finding to Corporate Communications. Only then did they relent, and authorise comments on the council's version of the film.

The intention of this vignette is to illustrate that the internet is no place for control freakery. Even where an organisation tries to restrict debate for fear of criticism, it is likely that the debate will surface elsewhere. When organisation establishes a presence on the internet, it should understand that in doing so, it is expected to "join the conversation".

This should be a wonderful thing, especially for organisations like local councils which have a deeply rooted reputation as inert, non-responsive institutions. However, it is understandable that an organisation may be unwilling to open the floodgates - in doing so, it is likely to discover public relations challenges it never knew existed.

(Thats good news for us by the way!)