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Monthly Archives: August 2015

Three Lessons Learned from Subway’s Crisis

26 Wednesday Aug 2015

Posted by Dimitris Agrafiotis in Cases, Crisis

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crisis communications, Subway

by Hilary Fussell Sisco

Source: Institute for Public Relations 

When a crisis occurs, an organization needs to go above and beyond the publics’ expectations to manage the situation. The recent affair with Subway tests the foundational elements of crisis management.

In early July, it was reported that federal agents raided Subway’s longtime pitchman Jared Fogle’s home where they seized electronics and computers. These early reports stated Fogle was sitting with investigators at the home and was not under arrest or being charged. Subway then said they believed the search was “related to a prior investigation” of someone who used to work for Fogle’s foundation who had been charged in May for production of child pornography and possession of child pornography. After the raid, Subway quickly responded that they had “mutually agreed with Jared to suspend their relationship” pending the investigation.

Then, Subway stayed silent for a month. They did not make any statements about Fogle or the ongoing investigation until August 1, when they tweeted “The latest allegation about Jared Fogle if true, is appalling. As previously stated, we have suspended our relationship with Jared.”

Last week, as media reports increased with documentation of Fogle’s possession of child pornography, as well as instances of sex with minors, Subway officially ended its relationship with Jared. Their first tweet was concise, “We no longer have a relationship with Jared and have no further comment.” The following tweet attempted to reposition the brand, “Jared Fogle’s actions are inexcusable and do not represent our brand’s values. We had already ended our relationship with Jared.”

In this crisis, Subway should have taken several early steps to mitigate the situation. Subway had almost six weeks between the original raid and the increased media reports to enact a crisis management plan. Despite this ample amount of time, Subway could have taken advantage of three foundational elements of crisis communication:

Communication: The organization did not engage in dialogue with its public. This was a time when they could be addressing the issue either to reiterate the steps they were taking or to shift the topic of conversation away from the investigation. The organization began to receive immediate backlash for its use of “no comment” and the terse tweets that left many people perplexed.

Branding: Subway did not begin to remove Jared’s name, image, and other attributions from their stores and digital media until the charges were filed. This was an opportunity to launch a new idea or campaign that could reinforce Subway’s organizational values, but instead they waited to react to the investigation rather than take action.

Taking Responsibility: Fogle became a household name because of Subway. His notoriety, income and career have come from the company. Subway should take responsibility for their association with him and try to reposition themselves through honesty and accountability. In a crisis, often organizations will set up charity funds or other corporate social responsibility activities to offset the reputational damage; Subway has not taken these next steps.

Subway’s lack of immediate action has placed them behind the curve. For organizations to be successful in crisis management they need to remember the basics, be open with your publics, remember your organization’s values and make amends if possible. Subway will need to do much more to move forward now that they are playing catch up behind this crisis.

Hilary Fussell Sisco, Ph.D., is an associate professor of strategic communication at Quinnipiac University. Follow her on Twitter @hfsisco.

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Lessons learnt about crisis communications in Greece during the last years

25 Tuesday Aug 2015

Posted by Dimitris Agrafiotis in Crisis

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crisis communications, Greek crisis, lessons learnt, social media

crisis_management

During the last 7 years, the companies operating in Greece, Greek or foreign ones, have to deal with a continuous crisis. The difficult fiscal situation in combination with a social unrest has created a challenging environment for the private sector. Several companies faced a series of communication challenges which evolved into crises. The most notorious example is about one of the biggest FMCG companies in Greece that a few years ago decided to close down one of its production lines in the country. The labour union politicized their struggle against the company demanding from the management of the company to reconsider its decision.  The company’s management kept a hard stance against the labour union which took advantage of the political status quo.

This is just one of the many examples of crisis communications cases for businesses in Greece during the last challenging years. The Greek crisis has made us a bit wiser about handling crisis communications and the lessons learnt might apply to other environments in international level.  So, what have we learnt so far?

  • Any crisis communications plan must be flexible in order to adjust it in any case especially in an unstable external environment.
  • The worst case scenario is the base of a crisis communications plan. We may pray for the best but we need to be prepared for the worst. Unfortunately several Greek companies just crossed their fingers in order to deal with situations that eventually damaged their reputation.
  • In order to reduce costs, several Greek companies decided to weaken their communications teams. They may have achieved savings but they left their companies without the necessary and experiences human resources to deal with a crisis.
  • A crisis communications plan might include the opportunity to strengthen the reputation of a company.
  • A company has to be sincere, honest and apologetic if necessary. It’s a common mistake that companies fear to admit wrongdoing because they consider it weakness.
  • Greek companies followed the trend of social media in order to enhance their reputation but they discovered, sometimes the hard way, that communications are a two-way street and they might have to deal with a wave of negative comments and they were not ready for that.

These are some indicative lessons learnt about crisis communications in Greece during the last years. It would be great to have your views and thoughts about them

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New book: “The Euro Crisis in the Media: Journalistic Coverage of Economic Crisis and European Institutions”

12 Wednesday Aug 2015

Posted by Dimitris Agrafiotis in Books, Media

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book, euro crisis, media, Reuters

Reuters_book

We  found out a book to wait for. The Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism will publish in September a book called The Euro Crisis in the Media: Journalistic Coverage of Economic Crisis and European Institutions edited by Robert G. Picard.

Summary of the book:

The Euro Crisis produced the most significant challenge to European integration in 60 years―testing the structures and powers of the European Union and the Eurozone and threatening the common currency. This book explores how the financial and political crisis was portrayed in the European press and the implications of that coverage on public understanding of the developments, their causes, responsibilities for addressing the crisis, the roles and effectiveness of European institutions, and the implications for European integration and identity. It addresses factors that shaped news and analysis, the roles of European leaders, and the extent to which national and pan-European debates over the crisis occurred. In doing so, it provides a clear and readable explanation of what the portrayals tell us about Europe and European integration in the early twenty-first century.

The book will be available in September: http://www.amazon.com/Euro-Crisis-Media-Journalistic-Institutions/dp/1784530603/ 

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Advances in risk and crisis communication

12 Wednesday Aug 2015

Posted by Dimitris Agrafiotis in Crisis, Research

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cognitive behavioural science, crisis communication, crisis management, decision sciences, emergency communication, emergency management, emergency planning, International Journal of Risk Assessment and Management, pre-crisis planning, public perception, risk communication, risk perception, social sciences

cover

A new article related to crisis communications was published in the International Journal of Risk Assessment and Management. The title is ‘Advances in risk and crisis communication’ and the author is Sweta Chakraborty.

You may find below the abstract:

This article describes how advances in social and decision sciences have enhanced the understanding and development of risk communications. It takes into account how the public perceives and assesses risks are integral for industry communication plans. Specifically, the impact of trust on how the public will perceive risks and interpret relevant communications is evident and the effect is particularly poignant in crisis situations. It is therefore necessary to consider levels of trust in sources of information, as well as understand the post-trust environment when designing communications. Dedicated efforts to re-build trust are crucial to address both expected and unexpected operational and potential future risks. Future challenges in crisis risk communication will have their own unique circumstances, but a common thread is better pre-crisis planning involving the understanding of public perceptions of risk to deal with communication challenges that will inevitably arise.

The paper is available here: http://www.inderscienceonline.com/doi/abs/10.1504/IJRAM.2015.069019 

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Helping behavior in a virtual crisis situation: effects of safety awareness and crisis communication

11 Tuesday Aug 2015

Posted by Dimitris Agrafiotis in Crisis, Research

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crisis communications, crisis management, risk awareness, risk communication

A new article related to crisis communications was published in the Journal of Risk Research. The title is ‘Helping behavior in a virtual crisis situation: effects of safety awareness and crisis communication’ and authors are H.E. Stubbéa, M.L. van Emmerika & J.H. Kerstholtab.

You may find below the abstract:

Incident evaluations show that bystanders tend to help: they do not wait for professionals to arrive, but act as required by the situation at hand. In the present study, we investigated how safety awareness (induced before an accident happened) and providing a course of action by emergency services affect helping behavior after witnessing a virtual accident with two victims. The main task of the participants was to arrive at a job interview in time. Safety awareness was manipulated by the specific organization they went to: either promoting safe traffic or healthy living. The results show that all participants were inclined to help. Participants who were primed towards safe traffic more often called the emergency number, but talked to the victim less often. Participants who had received specific courses of action moved the victim less often. In all, the results clearly indicate the value of effective risk communication (before an event occurs) and crisis communication (after an event has occurred), as both types of information improve the quality of actual helping behavior at the scene.

The paper is available here: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13669877.2015.1071865#.VcoHT0I1ZQA

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Only about crisis communications

11 Tuesday Aug 2015

Posted by Dimitris Agrafiotis in Crisis, General

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Tags

crisis, crisis management

“When you face a crisis, you know who your true friends are” said Magic Johnson a few years ago. Well, he’s totally right but I would like to add that when you face a crisis, you find out who you really are . If you are a communicator, you live and breathe for these difficult moments where you have to show all the skills and the experience you have acquired all the previous years.

A crisis makes a communications professional necessary if he/she knows what to do. If not, this person opens the door to hell.

This blog intends to present good and bad practices of crisis management focusing on the communications side, academic papers, books, testimonials and relevant articles from other sources.

I hope you enjoy it.

Please feel free to send me your comments.

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