As observed recently, in times of crisis, a business in times must be able to respond promptly, accurately, and effectively or suffer a major reputational setback. The people in charge of the communication response constitute the crisis communication team.
Who should be on that crisis communication team? Read on to learn the five roles you’ll need.
But first, what is crisis communication? A sub-specialty of public relations, crisis communication is the strategic approach to corresponding with people and organizations during a disruptive event.
Effective crisis communication involves planning and investment in necessary resources.
But neither a crisis communication plan nor crisis communication software works on its own. For either element to work when it matters most, the business will need the crisis communication team to get things going.
So, what does the crisis communication plan say about roles and responsibilities?
Well, let’s start with what a crisis communication plan is first.
The crisis communication plan is a set of guidelines and activities used to prepare an organization for the knowledge sharing aspects of an emergency or unexpected event.
What goes in it?
Audiences and activation criteria are two elements. They include:
Crisis teams should know to whom the crisis communication plan is addressed, i.e., its audience. Relevant audiences for a crisis communication plan are likely to include:
Crisis communication plans sometimes form important supplements (or annexes) of larger incident plans. That means they are only activated when the incident in question requires communicating.
Organizations must, therefore, consider the kinds of incidents that typically trigger the need to communicate with the public. Examples might include:
Beyond audiences and activation criteria, the crisis communication plan will also lay out a chain of command. Implicit are the crisis communication roles needed to activate and enforce the crisis communication plan.
The people who fulfill crisis communication roles are members of the crisis communication team.
The team’s key responsibility is to clarify reporting relationships to eliminate confusion and ensure that everyone can control the actions of personnel under supervision.
5 members of the crisis communication team
But who to tap for your crisis communication team? Certain best-practice standards recommend putting senior managers from the company’s most important business units on the crisis communication team, as well. Those managers often come from the following departments:
However, here are the five most important crisis communication roles:
Crisis management leaders have a wide range of crucial crisis communication responsibilities that start with pre-crisis planning and end with post-crisis identification of lessons learned. Further responsibilities include:
General Counsels spot issues and resolve problems. They provide advice and mitigate risk. Further responsibilities include:
PIOs verify, coordinate, and disseminate accurate, accessible, and timely information on the incident’s cause, size, and current situation, for both internal and external use. Further responsibilities include:
Corporate communications managers defend their internal clients in the court of public opinion. Further responsibilities include:
Business continuity professionals are always thinking about and preparing for events that might disrupt business operations. They are often on crisis communication teams, as well. However, their core responsibilities include:
Finally, deft crisis communication, in this era of ever-increasing and highly mediatized crises, has never been more important. However, corresponding with people and organizations during a disruptive event requires a finely-tuned crisis communication team.