Crisis communication resources to help you protect your revenue, reputation, and brand.
Effective crisis communications when “it” hits the fan.
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In the classic sense, it is not a crisis, but there is an underlying crisis communications lesson regarding the Saturday Night Live sketch on February 28, 2015. Social media is buzzing with opinions about whether SNL went too far.
SNL mocked a commercial where a father drops his daughter at the airport as she heads off to fight for the U.S. military. In the sketch, the punch line is that the daughter joins ISIS, rather the U.S. military.
Is this type of humor over the top. Yes? Is that the purpose of SNL? Yes? Do I care whether anyone else things it is funny or perfect? Not really.
The crisis communications lesson here is that people constantly judge. Their judgment gets loud and amplified on social media.
According to the Gerard Braud “Rule of Thirds,” one third of the people will always love your institution or your company. One third will always hate your institution or your company. Then there is a third in the middle that will swing like a pendulum.
If your company experiences a social media crisis filled with the kind of opinions that SNL is facing, you should never try to win over the third that hates you. Yes, Taylor Swift is correct that, “Haters gonna hate, hate, hate.” In other words, the one third who hate you, for the most part, will never change their opinion.
Your goal should be to persuade, comfort, and win the third in the middle, while supporting the one third who do love your company.
You have likely been taught that you can please some of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time.
In the world of crisis communications, my expert advice is that you try to please 2/3rds of the people all of the time.
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The need for crisis communication has never been greater. The need for speed in crisis communications has never been greater.
The reality is that if you experience an incident that the public knows about, you should be communicating to them about it in one hour or less. The biggest problem with this one hour benchmark is that in a world with Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, that is still 59 minutes too long.
Look at this photograph. What do you see? Yes, those are workers running from a fireball as it is still rising. What else do you notice? Yes, when everyone should be moving toward safety someone stopped to snap a picture with a cell phone.
This event eventually claimed two lives and resulted in more than 100 reported injuries.
Within minutes of the photo being taken, workers built a complete Facebook page about the event. Meanwhile, the company took nearly three hours to issue the first news release. Other than the time of the event, there was nothing in that statement that was newsworthy or that could not have been written and approved three years before the event. It was boiler plate language. By the time it was released, the media and the public already knew every detail.
When “it” hits the fan in the age of social media, you have the option to control the flow of accurate information by releasing details faster than ever before. If you fail to do this you surrender control of the story to the general public, who may or may not have accurate information.
Granted, human resources needs to communicate with the families of the dead and injured. Granted, lawyers will want to avoid giving ammunition to the plaintiff’s attorney in your statement. Granted, facts need to be gathered by the home office. Granted, state police are acting as the primary spokespeople under a NIMS agreement.
But will you also grant this? The photo on Facebook and the Facebook page are providing more information to the public, the media, and plaintiff’s attorney than the official source is. And NIMS can provide a law officer to discuss evacuations, but a state trooper cannot express the necessary empathy that families need to hear, nor can they communicate the contrition that a community needs to hear.
What should you do? How can you get the upper hand?
Step one is to have an effective crisis communications plan that facilitates the fast gathering of information about any incident, combined with the fast dissemination of the details to key decision makers.
Step two is to have a “First Critical Statement” document in your crisis communications plan. The First Critical Statement is a fill-in-the-blank document that can be modified in five minutes and then posted to your corporate website, emailed to all employees, emailed to all media, read to the media at a news conference if needed, and also used as a link on your corporate social media sites.
Step three is to write a library of pre-written news releases with a more in depth system of fill-in-the-blank and multiple-choice options. Such news releases can be written on a clear sunny day, months or years before you will ever need to use them. The goal of the document is to answer every question you might be asked about a specific incident – ranging from fires and explosions, to workplace violence, to executive misbehavior. The pre-written nature of the release allows your leaders and legal teams to proofread the templates and pre-approve them. This saves time on the day of your incident. Usually, the pre-written document can be edited within ten minutes and approved nearly as fast. Once it is ready to use, it can be your script for a news conference, a post to your corporate website, an e-mail to all media and employees, plus a link on social media.
Check your calendar: It’s 2015. Check your computer and smartphone: Social media amplifies everything the public sees or thinks. Check your decision-making: It is time for you to have a modernized fast moving crisis communications plan.
The bottom line is that your reputation and revenue depend upon it.
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Media interviews are often composed of opinion questions. Jimmy Kimmel Live provides us with today’s timely media interview perspectives, with interviews about the Oscars. As you watch and laugh at this, read on to the crisis communications tip at the end of this article.
Reports are infamous for asking leading questions. In media training classes, each potential spokesperson should be cautioned about not taking the bait when a reporter asks a leading question. In other words, when a premise is injected by the reporter, expert media training should teach the spokesperson to have the freedom to reject the premise.
Jimmy Kimmel live does a great gag called Lie Witness News, in which a fake reporter conducts what are known as “man on the street interviews.”
The Academy Awards is one of the most hyped events of the year. There’s a lot of pressure to have an informed opinion about the movies that are nominated. So, Kimmel sent a camera onto Hollywood Boulevard to ask people what they thought about some nominated movies and moments he made up.
What these people do is something you don’t want to do. They take the bait.
When your organization experiences a crisis, reporters will go looking for quotes and sound bites. If your company and your spokesperson fail to provide a fast sound bite or quote, the media will conduct man on the street interviews. These man on the street interviews are with uninformed individuals who have not had media training and are willing to take the bait to enjoy 15 seconds of fame.
Jimmy Kimmel creates some great laughs with his gag. If this happens to you in real life it is no laughing matter.
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Where is the ExxonMobil news release for the ExxonMobil Torrance Refinery explosion? An explosion is a crisis, which requires expert crisis communications. The media would expect information on the corporate news release page. Media want it fast and easy to find.
But look what you find on the ExxonMobil news release page – A fluff release about a summer jobs program.
Really ExxonMobil?
Oil may have come from the age of the dinosaurs, but public relations in 2015 shouldn’t be prehistoric in nature.
Is ExxonMobil playing hide and seek with their news release?
At the bottom of the ExxonMobil page I found three social media links. I clicked on Twitter and found a statement that I’ve written about before – the dreaded and preposterous, “Our top priority statement.” The Tweet says, “Our top priority is the safety of our employees, contractors and neighbors in Torrance.” Obviously it isn’t your top priority, otherwise you would not have had an explosion with four people sent to the hospital, right?
Come on PR people: Enough with the bad clichés that you can’t defend. My top priority is to get public relations people to stop saying, “Our top priority.”
The link on Twitter sends me to this news release page, which did not appear in my initial search. Note the time stamp on the hidden news release – 10 a.m. ET on February 19, 2015. Now note the first sentence of the news release – it indicates the explosion happened at 8:50 a.m. PST on February 18, 2015. If there is an earlier release, it is hidden from me.
I have to question, why does it take nearly a day for a news release to be posted? This is absurd. This is 2015 and we live in the age of Twitter. No corporation should go more than one hour before a news release is posted. And don’t blame it on your lawyers or your executives. An expert public relations leader must learn to deal with lawyers and executives before a crisis so that your crisis communications can move with haste and professionalism. Your crisis communication plan should be filled with pre-written and pre-approved news releases. Geez!
Even on Twitter on the day of the explosion there is no ExxonMobil Twitter post related to the explosion, yet citizens are posting images and details about the crisis trending on #torranceexplosion.
Now let us examine the news release as ExxonMobil plays hide the facts and details. Compare the ExxonMobil release that mentions an “incident,” to the headlines on Google, which uses words such as “explosion” and a host of descriptors such as “rips though refinery,” “rocked by large explosion,” etc.
While ExxonMobil uses clichés such as “top priority” and “incident,” the NBC Los Angeles website describes, “Crushed cars, mangled metal, flames and a health warning.” Their lead says, “Hours after an explosion ripped through a Torrance refinery, residents for miles around continue to grapple with ash, a gas odor and concerns over poor air quality…”
Something tells me this was more than an “incident.”
In a crisis, it is important for official sources to provide official information. It is also important to control SEO. From a control perspective, the corporation should be controlling the flow of accurate information, rather than surrendering to the rumors and opinions for the public.
In the 2014 Fortune 500 list, ExxonMobil is listed as second. Some might wonder if their PR is second rate.
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With this photo of me and Anderson Cooper, I’ll make other observations.
Anderson Cooper and other media must proceed cautiously in their discussion of Brian Williams. The standards they hold Williams to will be applied to them as well.
Let us peak behind the curtain on how the media cover the news, based on my experience as a television news reporter for 15 years.
Many people have a flawed perception of the media based on what they think the media are. People fail to realize that being a journalist is a complicated job. Reporters must make complicated choices daily about what to put on television and what not to put on television.
Let me take you behinds the scene on an Anderson Cooper and Gerard Braud (Jared Bro) story that didn’t make the news.
The photo you see above is me, in the Top Hat and Tails with the large pink beads, talking to Anderson Cooper. Behind me is my brass band, and behind the band is a yellow cross that says, “Jesus is Love.”
This is Mardi Gras 2006, just six months after Hurricane Katrina. The events of this moment were not reported by Anderson Cooper because there was no conflict, even though moments before, six CNN cameras were moving in on my group as the cross-carrying-group taunted us in ways that set the stage for a potential street fight and some amazing news footage.
As I tell the story, think about these questions:
What does this say about media coverage?
What does this say about the judgments the media make every day?
What might this say about Anderson Cooper and all media who try to tip toe into and around the Brian Williams crisis?
I’ll answer those questions after I give you this brief side note on who I am when you don’t see me in my professional capacity.
Gerard Braud as the Krewe of Mid-City jester.
I was born in New Orleans on Monday, February 10, 1958. Mardi Gras day was just eight days later. Mom says she held me at the hospital window as the parades rolled by. I’m a Mardi Gras nut through and through. I volunteer as a board member for the Krewe of Mid-City parade. The Krewe is one of the 34 self-funded, non-commercial parades that roll down a 60-block parade route through the neighborhoods. We roll past screaming children on ladders waiting to catch a bead or stuffed animal from me, as their parents manage picnics and bar-b-ques. I’ve been a parade King and serve as the Krewe Jester. And truth be known – 12 hours before this photo was taken I lead a comedy sketch in which I portrayed the ugly “Queen Katrina Duvet Debris” (which is why I can never run for Congress). I’m also the founder of the Krewe’s Gentlemen’s Top Hat, Tails and Cigar Stroll, in which, accompanied by a brass band, we walk through the French Quarter bestowing beads and smiles upon those who have come to New Orleans to experience a slice of our culture.
On the day in the photo, our Gentlemen were smiling as we headed down Bourbon Street with our band and the crowd was smiling with us. After Hurricane Katrina, everyone in New Orleans needed a reason to smile and we were there to do just that. As we approached the Royal Sonesta Hotel, the out-of-town-cross-carrying-group that shows up every year to condemn everyone they see, began to shout at us over their megaphone. They were marching toward us with aggression. (And don’t get me started on how these people obviously missed the part where Jesus talked about not throwing stones and loving thy neighbor. #hypocrite )
They began to shout condemnation toward us via their megaphone. Anderson Cooper and his crew jumped to their feet. Anderson grabbed his video camera and hurried toward me. Cameras on booms came floating down from the balconies above us. Producers were getting excited. They were likely writing mental headlines about The Mardi Gras Melee that would lead tonight’s broadcast. You just can’t beat a headline with alliteration!
The crisis management guy and former reporter in me stopped our group, as I saw the story CNN wanted to tell, but which I was not going to let unfold or be told.
I gathered my guys and the band together. I asked if the band knew how to play Amazing Grace. The band members huddled and worked out the key. Meanwhile, I instructed the Gentlemen to line up in straight rows across the street. The instructions were for everyone to smile and to make no verbal or physical contact with the cross carrying group. The band struck up Amazing Grace and we walked peacefully through the angry cross carriers, demonstrating the irony of “the sinners” were acting more like saints than the self-anointed loud mouths.
There was amazing disappointment on the faces of every member of the CNN crew. In the photo, Anderson is rolling video tape, asking me, “What just happened?” “Who are you guys?”
We chatted, knowing that a potential story just evaporated into thin air for CNN.
What does this say about media coverage? News is generally negative. 99% of what is shot on videotape is thrown away.
What does this say about the judgements the media make everyday? If it is not negative, is it not news?
What might this say about Anderson Cooper and all media who try to tip toe into and around the Brian Williams crisis? There are millions of people who have encounters with the media, who are ready to tell their side of the story regarding their interaction with reporters. The more the media cover Brian Williams, the more those covering his story could find themselves being scrutinized over what they have covered or not covered in the past.
Anderson Cooper didn’t cover my story because I intentionally made it a non-story.
With Allen Braud, my dad, on February 25, 2001 when I reigned as King Mid-City LXVIII.
Anderson made the right call that day, but I can also hear the cries of those who would think he should have made a news story out of it anyway.
(If you don’t hear much from me over the next few days, it is because this is the weekend of the Krewe of Mid-City Parade on Sunday, and the Gentlemen’s Top Hat, Tails & Cigar Stroll on Saturday. I hope we get to share a smile together.)
P.S. In keeping with my Brian Williams blog from two days ago, the above story is true to the teller.
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Leave it to Jon Stewart to once again be the expert voice of reason in modern media. He clearly points out in this crisis that there is the “Brian Williams Anchorman” persona, and as I pointed out previously, the “Brian Williams Storyteller” persona at public events where he appears as a celebrity speaker or guest.
At question is the brand – credibility.
At stake is reputation – damaged.
At the heart of it – two layers. A crisis for Williams the journalist and a crisis for NBC, the corporation.
NBC, in imposing a six-month suspension without pay for Brian Williams, has created a scenario in which I do think Williams can recover. In other words, I would be surprised if he ever returns to the anchor desk at NBC Nightly News ever again. I would not be surprised to see Williams announce his resignation.
Crisis management requires finesse. A crisis response too little or too late is bad. A crisis response too large makes the crisis worse and creates a series of secondary crises.
Think of crisis management the way you might think of parenting – let the punishment fit the crime. If your child leaves their bike in the driveway behind the car, a proper response is to take away their bike. Taking away every toy they own would be too extreme.
The offenses by Williams appear to have been primarily in celebrity appearances. Hence, the proper vehicle for NBC would have been to prohibit the celebrity Brian Williams from making celebrity appearances. By making such an announcement, NBC could have focused on where the sins were committed, yet opened the door for redemption by putting Williams back on the air after his self-imposed one-week suspension. This announcement should have been combined with my previous suggestion that Williams appear on the Today Show Friday with some of the soldiers who called him out. Such an appearance would have put a punctuation mark on the crisis that defines its end.
NBC, by suspending Williams for six months will remove this story from the headlines quicker. However, the harsh penalty means that if they return Williams in six months, the story will regenerate.
My opinion is that NBC News went too far.
Likely, the only way Williams could return to the anchor desk is if the veterans who called him out for his errors rallied to his side to support him, asking NBC to return him to the air very soon. My crystal ball doesn’t see that happening, although I wish it would.
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By Gerard Braud –
The reality is that if you experience an incident that the public knows about, you should be communicating to them about it in one hour or less. The biggest problem with this one hour benchmark is that in a world with Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, that is still 59 minutes too long.
Within minutes of the photo being taken, workers built a complete Facebook page about the event. Meanwhile, the company took nearly three hours to issue the first news release. Other than the time of the event, there was nothing in that statement that was newsworthy or that could not have been written and approved three years before the event. It was boiler plate language. By the time it was released, the media and the public already knew every detail.
often composed of opinion questions. 
Really ExxonMobil?
By