How to handle a crisis as a public relations practitioner
When you are a public relations practitioner, your job is to address and handle not only external communications efforts, but also internal communications, especially an internal crisis. In public relations, a good reputation is vital in order to be a successful firm. An internal crisis can easily become an external crisis, if not handled with care and can be detrimental to a company. Like stated earlier a public relations practitioner’s job is to swiftly and successful foster good communications for companies, and the crucial trust between companies and its audience can be lost, if the firm itself cannot handle its own internal crisis properly. That is why it is so important to handle crisis well as a public relations practitioner.
The first step I would take to handle this crisis is to call an immediate emergency meeting with all executives of the company. Before you can handle an internal crisis, you must make certain that the leadership of the firm has a cohesive knowledge of the situation and has a plan in place. You must give them the opportunity to discuss and brainstorm the best steps the company should take to handle the crisis.
Once the executives have designed a plan to address this crisis, I would call an all-staff meeting in order to educate the staff about the crisis itself and present the crisis plan. Because the leadership of the firm has developed a cohesive crisis plan, they can now be confident in leading the rest of the staff in the implementation process. This confidence creates a trust between the staff and executives. This trust shows that they are fully capable of successfully handling this crisis. The trust, confidence and open communication the firm will display through this are crucial in order to carry out a large-scale crisis plan like a breach in security.
Next, I would assign a writer to formulate a press release that addresses the crisis as well as the plan of action, which is already starting to be implemented. A press release is an unspoken rule/formality in any crisis. It is important that the company be honest and transparent about the situation, no matter how minor or severe the crisis may be. It is better, to be honest about a crisis and receive some negative feedback than to not address it at all publically and be seen as deceptive and lose trust with the company’s audience.
After sending out the press release, I would implement the first step of the company’s plan of action. I would bring in a professional corporate security team to help coordinate efforts to resolve this crisis. I would assign a team of executives to educate them about the crisis as well as the crisis plan. I would then have an open discussion to receive feedback from them on our technological efforts to restore security at the company and implement their recommendations as necessary. This shows that Data-Time Inc. is recognizing the issue at hand needs professional technological attention from an outside source. This effort, which is also outlined in the press release, shows the public that Data-Time Inc. is taking all steps necessary to resolve this crisis and ensure that it does not happen again.
The next step would be to contact those whom the crisis affects the most, the homeless population. Since it is difficult to directly contact this population, I would recommend the best way to reach them would be through the homeless shelters and clinics themselves. I would send representatives from Data-Time Inc. to both of the locations and have them set up an informational booth at the entrance. This allows them to control the flow of information directly from the company representatives itself. The Data-Time Inc. representatives will have flyers to hand out to those who walk in. The flyer would have an explanation of the situation along with a time/date of a meeting to attend hosted by Data-Time Inc.
Next, the company would host group meetings with the members of the homeless population who could have been affected by this security breach. Data-Time Inc. would inform each person of the steps being taken to resolve the situation and offer opportunities to speak with representatives of the company one-on-one. By doing this, Data-Time Inc. can better understand their individual concerns and help each of them understand the steps they can take to secure their personal data. I would also recommend providing legal assistance to the individuals affected from a local law firm.
Throughout the next few weeks, I would also continually update the homeless shelter and clinic of the situation’s progress. This allows for an open communication channel between all parties involved. It also continues to foster trust and confidence in the company’s efforts to combat the crisis.
After all of the previous steps are completed, I would instruct that Data-Time Inc. to do a post-crisis workshop with all of its employees concerning data security. In this workshop, Data-Time Inc. would teach ways to prevent theft of employee laptops and other important security items. This shows an internal effort to prevent the same crisis from occurring again.
Analyzing a crisis situation like this helps us, as communications students, to better understand how to most effectively handle a crisis in a timely manner. It helps us realize all of the people that a crisis can affect and how to address each of them properly.
