Violence striking the workplace is a nightmare scenario for any organization. Unfortunately, the ugly reality is that these things can and do happen, as has once again been made apparent by several recent workplace shootings, all occurring within one week of each other. A recent article from BusinessInsurance.com featured an …
Misbehaving on Allegiant Air
Anyone who has children knows they can be a handful, especially among the chaos of boarding an airplane, which causes stress to many adults. Apparently though, the folks at Allegiant Air are not too sympathetic. After an Arizona mom’s young children, with whom she was traveling alone, became restless and …
Maclaren Recall Crisis
Safe to say the management team at Maclaren is having a terrible week. On Monday its U.S. subsidiary issued a press release announcing a recall of every baby stroller it has sold in the United States in the past decade — which means about one million units. The purpose is …
Taking an Advantage
Social media continues to create waves as more and more organizations and influential individuals climb on board. The advantages these platforms provide for crisis management are clear, as a recent blog post by social media consultant Richard Stacy explained: Social media allows you to communicate directly with the people you …
Big Mistake
Most hospitals strive to maintain a reputation of compassion and care, so when a purported billing department error at the UC Davis Medical Center caused a terse letter to be sent to the parents of a tragically deceased student, it hatched a crisis management nightmare. Another startling article from The …
Crossing the Line
While retail stores certainly have the right to detain suspected shoplifters, there is a line that can be crossed. According to a story posted on The Consumerist, a Michigan WalMart has been accused of not just crossing that line, but taking a flying leap over it. The details: In the …
Evolution of Communication
Crisis communications is a constantly changing field. In his article, “The Evolution of Crisis Communication,” written for the latest Crisis Manager,Thomas E. Lee uses his experiences, both past and present, to create a list of five principles integral to crisis communications success in 2009. How are the rules different now, …
The Other Side
Almost every public relations professional has, or will, manage a client’s communications in a crisis situation. We all know the drills. But, how many of us have been on the other side, crisis management for the plaintiff’s side; working for the organization that wanted the publicity to continue. In a …
Tools for Twitter
Though I’ve mentioned tools for Twitter many times before, the technology custom-crafted for the service changes almost daily. A recent Wall Street Journal Online article detailing the latest in “must-have” software explains the need for these utilities: Twitter’s popularity as a customer-service and public-relations tool for businesses is growing. But …
Twitter 101 for Business & Crisis Management
Every day, millions of people use Twitter to create, discover and share ideas with others. Now, people are turning to Twitter as an effective way to reach out to businesses, too. From local stores to big brands, and from brick-and-mortar to internet-based or service sector, people are finding great value …
New Crisis Manager
Hot on the heels of the last issue, there’s yet another new Crisis Manager up at the Bernstein Crisis Management website. We’ve got some excellent material in this edition. The first piece is an article that could help prevent 95% of all crises. The second is an analysis of a …
Crisis Management Guidance
Every crisis management expert has their own guiding tenets – principles and ideas they use to shape their strategies and responses. Leadership coach Dan Greer today shared some advice gleaned from legendary GE PR man Jack Welch’s book “Winning,” on his top five guiding assumptions. One of my favorites: There …
Crisis Simulation
One of the best ways to learn how to handle a crisis is to simulate it. This way, you can identify gaps in crisis preparedness and work to close them before a real event occurs. To this end, the Kansas Emergency Management Agency has built “Crisis City,” a serious staging …
Solving Online Crises
In allowing people to easily make their opinions extremely public, the Internet has created an entirely new type of crisis management. The problem with this is that many execs, secure in their ways, have a hard time taking this to heart. The latest Crisis Manager features an article by guest …
Surviving Attacks
Penny Sansaveieri, CEO and founder of Author Marketing Experts, Inc., is a best-selling author and internationally recognized book marketing and media relations expert. In the latest Crisis Manager newsletter, she shares with us how to survive an online attack on your reputation. With all the ways to get media these …