Does Your Organization Have a Crisis Communications Plan in Place? Is Your Staff Trained and Prepared?
If you don’t have a plan in place, when you are faced with a crisis, chances are you won’t have the resources to handle it.
A crisis spawns chaos, frantic people, and inaccurate information in the initial hours.
Before the @%$# hits the fan:
- Participate in planning with staff and counsel to determine areas of risk
- Develop a crisis plan for issues with high impact or high probability
- Have clear identification of the official spokesperson
- Train management and staff, so they know what to do if a crisis occurred
- Make sure all key responders have copies of or access to the plan
- Make sure the plan is kept up to date
- Conduct exercises to test your crisis communications
How to ensure effective internal communications take place during a crisis:
- Have clear identification of internal communication procedures with a plan developed ahead of time that clearly ties internal communications into the overall plan and describes the expectations, roles, and responsibilities
- Provide easy to read information that outlines WHAT EMPLOYEES NEED TO KNOW about the organization’s emergency communications procedures
