By: Katherine Heaviside, President, Epoch 5 Public Relations
Having managed crisis communications for nearly 40 years, I thought I had reached the day where I had ‘seen it all.’ Not so. Over the last two weeks, the Coronavirus pandemic has re-written the playbook for crisis communications – and this is true for government and elected officials as well as for private sector businesses in every industry.
For Long Island businesses, communication in the age of Coronavirus must be managed with speed and precision as never before.
Speed in your communication is essential because new announcements, government regulations and requirements are coming down at a breakneck pace. You are going to need to communicate very quickly with staff, partners, vendors, customers and the general public about the steps and changes you are taking proactively as well as how you are reacting to government mandates. You might be called by the media if you are closing a location or a top official is known to be infected.
Precision in communication is vital because a poorly phrased statement can cause confusion, raise fear or even incite panic and ultimately cause reputational damage to your business. Once the Coronavirus cloud has lifted, you would not want your business to be long remembered for a clumsy response.
In a crisis, internal and external messaging must be strategic and it must be consistent. Today’s multiple means of instant communication – e-mail, group text, websites and social media – makes this more of a challenge, since it is frighteningly easy to rush out an ill-conceived e-mail or Instagram post. Similarly, managers must be given consistent guidance (talking points) when communicating with their own divisions to avoid confusion and the spread of rumors.
Top management, human resource departments and internal communication teams are all being stretched to the limits by the daily challenges of new Coronavirus developments, so this is a time where crisis consultants can play an essential role in coordinating communications with a strategic eye to protecting and rebuilding your business.
Businesses should be developing a package of potential communication pieces now, targeted to specific stakeholders such as employees, customers and the media, based on a number of possible scenarios which could rapidly unfold.
This pandemic outbreak is causing challenges and hurdles few had envisioned – and from every projection there are more to come before things begin to improve. Remember, you are not able to control what happens in the weeks and months ahead, but you can control your response with planning and preparation.
By: Katherine Heaviside, President, Epoch 5 Public Relations
