[ business ]
Crisis
Management
Seven Steps to
Prepare Your
Organization
JENNIFER VIEWEG
A technology data breach. A #MeToo
harassment scandal. A product failure or
recall. An environmental spill. A work-
place accident. The potential for crisis in
business is varied and numerous. Proper
handling of a crisis provides an opportunity
for leaders to preserve and potentially
improve their organization’s reputation
with customers, opinion leaders and the
general public. However, a poorly handled
crisis can lead to irreparable and potentially
devastating damage. These seven steps can
help you prepare today for any crisis your
organization may encounter tomorrow.
Step 1: Find your ethical compass.
Amid a crisis, pressure is high, deci-
sions are critical, and time is short. Under
these circumstances, ethical lines can
become blurred, particularly if they are
not clearly defined. This is why you must
define your ethical compass. For example,
in 2017 United Airlines was embroiled
in crisis when a paying customer was
forcibly removed from a flight and ulti-
mately required medical attention. The
crisis was compounded when United’s
CEO supported the abusive actions of
the employees rather than apologizing to
the customer and acknowledging that his
company’s policies should be reviewed.
Being secure in your ethical compass can
help you avoid making missteps and ex-
acerbating crisis situations.
Step 2: Set ethical standards
for your organization. Step 3: Develop a crisis
response plan.
Once you know your ethical compass,
set those same boundaries as the standard
for your organization and communicate
them to your employees. This step is
essential because those on your team
must be aware of what you consider
acceptable behavior in order to follow your
example. To illustrate this point, last year
banking and financial services company
Wells Fargo admitted their team mem-
bers had falsified millions of customer
accounts. Multiple news outlets reported
that these ethical breaches were facilitated
by leaders who set unreasonable sales
goals for employees that encouraged
them to prioritize performance ahead
of honesty and financial results over
responsibility. Organizational leaders
can help avoid these types of crises by
cultivating ethical climates within their
organizations. This involves defining
acceptable and appropriate treatment
of employees, customers, neighbors and
the environment and, equally important,
communicating those boundaries with
employees so those guidelines can be
deployed and implemented at all levels of
the company. Setting an ethical foundation
and communicating those guidelines to
employees can enable your organization to
emerge from crises stronger or possibly
avoid them altogether. Crisis response plans enable organi-
zations to handle challenging situations
effectively by preparing leaders to respond
immediately to any crisis, be forthright
and accurate with information and keep
stakeholders up to date in a timely manner.
While crisis plans do not explore all pos-
sible crises that could occur for a specific
organization, they identify the necessary
tools, resources and team members who
can be deployed in the event of a crisis.
They also prepare materials in advance
that expediate an appropriate response
and provide guidance on how to respond
to crises of varying severities. If your
organization does not have an effective
and up-to-date crisis response plan, con-
sider engaging a strategic communica-
tions professional who can offer exper-
tise in crisis response. The expert will
work with you to develop a crisis plan
for your organization and may also offer
relevant training to help prepare your
leadership team for a crisis.
Step 4: Tell your story.
Stories are powerful. They have the
potential to inspire, teach and guide. As
they relate to crises, stories can be useful
in educating and informing audiences. As
a leader, you need to tell your story so
audiences are aware of your organization:
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