Crisis Playbook

Ready-made and custom crisis plans with support from experienced crisis leaders

  • About
    • Privacy Policy
    • Terms of Use
  • Blog
  • Contact
  • Our Products
    • Our Plans & Products
    • Cart
    • Checkout
  • Services
  • Newsletter
  •  
  • About
    • Privacy Policy
    • Terms of Use
  • Blog
  • Contact
  • Our Products
    • Our Plans & Products
    • Cart
    • Checkout
  • Services
  • Newsletter
  •  

Tips and Tricks: Thinking Through Your Next Crisis Now

Its Friday afternoon when the phone rings. Something truly bad has happened – something that could change the face of your company. What to do next?

Breathe deep and think through these steps:

  1. Gather the essential information. Gather all of the essential information. Not everything will be available right away, but more information will come in over time. Ask good questions about the who, what, where, when and why of the incident. What happened, who was impacted, where did this occur, is there a looming threat, was anyone injured, and are there other details about why this happened??
  2. Convene the right partners. If you have it, and you haven’t used it already, this is the time to apply your Crisis Playbook plan because now you need to think through the communications, social media, HR, operations, customer service, and other needs. Bring the leaders of those teams together to weigh in through a conference call or at a private location that everyone can meet – try to pull everyone together within the next hour.
  3. Share out. All of the key leaders should share an update on what they know as of that moment. That means the operations and/or field team should give an update about the known facts – and what is still unknown. The communications and/or social media person should share about whether there has been any media or social media activity yet. After the update, review each person’s role and their next steps. Capture this information in the notes and send a recap to everyone so they have a clear roadmap. Repeat this step every few hours during a major incident – or once a day for a less severe situation.
  4. Law enforcement. If the incident warrants police or agency involvement, reach out to identify a point of contact and open line of communication.
  5. Lessons Learned: After your company gets past the incident, gather the team to discuss the lessons learned and opportunities to improve while it is fresh in their minds. This is a great time to review your Crisis Playbook plan and make tailored changes wherever there were gaps. Every incident is an opportunity to practice your plan and make improvements.

For more on specific incidents, there are Crisis Playbook chapters for a variety of situations. Having a crisis plan will help you guide your team – or serve as a helpful member of the response team.

Crisis Planning: Why it’s Important and How to be Strategic

The phone rings. It’s a local reporter calling to get your comment regarding an incident at your company. Oh shoot – you just learned about the crisis moments ago, how did the media hear about it already? Or worse yet – this is the first time you’ve heard about it.

Yep. This happens everyday to another company. You think, “Quick – grab the crisis plan so we have a starting place.” Wait, no one ever completed the plan? Awesome. What should we do?

Let’s talk about why you need a crisis plan.

Planning means anticipating your greatest risks – its ok to have risks, everyone has them. By planning, you simply think through them and document what you would want to do. Is everything going to go exactly as planned during an incident? Of course not. But, at least you will have a place to start, an idea of how you would like things to go, known pitfalls to avoid to protect your company’s reputation, and your team will not be making things up on the fly. Because crisis response is not a pick-up game.

Having a crisis plan helps your team to get more comfortable with the response plan, their role and sets expectations for how things will go if an incident happens. Think of it like a reputational version of a fire, tornado or hurricane drill. The investment is minimal, but the return is significant – making this something on your “must do” list.

Recent Posts

  • Crisis Playbook: How our plans are different than the rest
  • Why Communications Need to be Part of Your Crisis Plan
  • Tips and Tricks: Thinking Through Your Next Crisis Now
  • Predictable Patterns During a Crisis
  • Crisis Planning: Why it’s Important and How to be Strategic

Say Hello

Contact us the old fashioned way.

+1.202.559.7451

PO Box 131414
Saint Paul, MN 55113
USA

Contact us via Email

Immediate 24x7Crisis Assistance:
crisis@crisisplaybook.com

Sales Inquiries:
sales@crisisplaybook.com

Support Inquiries
support@crisisplaybook.com

Follow Us

  • Facebook
  • Twitter

Copyright © Crisis Ventures LLC · All Rights Reserved

Crisis Playbook and the Crisis Playbook logo are registered trademarks of Crisis Ventures LLC in the United States and other countries

Proudly powered by WordPress and the Genesis Framework