Crisis!

Focus – “Crisis and Fear Within an Organizational Crisis”

            As we have seen throughout the semester most of the crisis case studies that we have examined have been for a specific organization. To further our study of crisis communication I have decided to look at a current crisis situation for a country. Specifically I would like us to examine Iran and its high investment in and development of a nuclear facilities. As we have seen this crisis has been brewing for a number of months and recent coverage heightened after President Obama, Prime Minster Gordon, and President Nicolas Sarkozy addressed their concerns at the G20 summit in Pittsburgh. The following link is to a video posted on YouTube that covers the remarks made by these leaders at the summit in October, 2009. The basic evidence provided by these world leaders describes the trigger event in that the “Islamic republic of Iran has failed to meet united nations resolutions and requirements and disclose information about the planning and construction of a nuclear facility near the city of Qom” (Obama, 2009). We have seen in a number of our case studies that increased media attention and scrutiny can dramatically impact your organizations reputation. The same applies to countries because in essence they are a very large organization and entity which have a reputation to manage.             

Nature of the Crisis

            This has certainly been the case as Iran has been gaining increased media coverage regarding their possible nuclear activities. I would like to point out here that during a time of crisis fear is certainly something that can heighten the crisis and impact the situation. For example the fear felt by many world leaders is Iran’s plan to build nuclear weapons at this production facility.

Key Stakeholders

            I think an interesting point to make regarding this case is that when such a crisis occurs regarding weapons issues the entire population becomes a key stakeholder. This is mainly due the fact that such a weapon could be used to harm millions of people in any location. Additionally when world politics plays a huge role in such a situation countries like Iran may become isolated. Politically this is very damaging but also it affects its economy and relationships with other countries. As we see from descriptions made by world leaders relationships are strained between Iran and the rest of the world. I have to wonder how a country could perform relationship management because the number of stakeholders is so large and diverse. If you were a crisis manager for Iran what strategies would be used as part of the crisis response?

Increased Media Coverage

            Today, November 16^th has seen increased coverage of this issue because UN inspectors were allowed to visit the Qom facility at the end of the last month and have revealed some of their concerns. The major concern is a need for more information regarding the facility and a spokesperson was quoted as saying "Iran's explanation about the purpose of the facility and the chronology of its design and construction requires further clarification." Additionally it is mentioned in news article that many western countries fear that Iran is trying to build weapons even though Iran claims it nuclear investment is “peaceful”. The following news articles have been included for reference so we can more fully understand the crisis situation and the response strategies used:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8362865.stm

http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/1116/p06s16-wome.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/nov/16/iran-nuclear-united-nations-report

            From my understanding and study of this crisis case it seems that one of the main flaws is a lack of clarity and honesty from Iran. I say this because it seems that if honesty was at the forefront of its concerns many world leaders would have been aware of its plans for nuclear facilities many years ago when construction first began. This lack of clarity is exemplified in the following section.

Iran’s Claim and Crisis Response Strategy

            Its claim to the peaceful nature rests on the plan to use the facility to produce Uranium that would ultimately fuel one of their research reactors. We have seen throughout this semester that Clarity within a crisis response is essential in addressing the crisis situation and is a best practice within crisis response messages (Coombs). However it seems that  “Iran has failed to give a clear response” According to BBC news. This of course has heightened concerns for this crisis and has dramatically increased news coverage regarding this issue. To illustrate how news coverage regarding this crisis has heightened I would like to share with you some recent posts made through the social media application, Twitter. The comments both spread the crisis situation and make it impossible for Iran to limit exposure. Thus information cannot be held in a vacuum. It also illustrates the role fear plays within a crisis situation. Sample posts include:

oplapla IAEA: Concerns over Iran nuke facilities: Iran's disclosure of a previously-secret nuclear facility near Qom ra.. http://bit.ly/3qR2Lv 

SalBarguil Iran told to reveal all nuclear facilities: Revelation of undeclared enrichment plant near Qom has reduced IAEA.. http://bit.ly/18ztVU

soulspirit86 Iran - IAEO ist unzufrieden mit Angaben über Atomanlage in Qom: Neuer Iran-Bericht: weitere Informationen zu Ba.. http://bit.ly/3J5OzY

Ri_po L'Iran pourrait commencer à enrichir de l'uranium sur son site près de Qom en 2011, selon l'AIEA #Iran 

Note: Twitter search was used to find these tweets on 16^th November 2009 – 3.30pm.

            As you can see from the last two “Tweet”, which are in German and French, news regarding this facility and UN inspection is a global issue and the fact that people globally are tweeting regarding this topic illustrates major concern. The main reason that I decided to cover this as part of one of my blog posts is that it addresses this idea of fear among crisis communication even though a major crisis has not yet occurred a possible threat still exists. Based on this case study and your own work I would like us to think about the following questions:

1.     As an organization how do you deal with fear among your publics? For example what would be some crisis response strategies that you might use to address their concern? Is fear a consequence of lack of clarity?

2.     Does fear impact reputation management? If so, how would you handle the impact that it may have on the organizations reputation?

3.     As a member of the public what do you think is the major concern for Iran in terms of this crisis and the impact it will have on global relations with other countries? 

The House ethics committee (OCE) is currently investigating seven African-American lawmakers — more than 15 percent of the total in the House. And an eighth black member, Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Ill.), would be under investigation if the Justice Department hadn’t asked the committee to stand down. Not a single white lawmaker is currently the subject of a full-scale ethics committee probe.

I mentioned this crisis two weeks ago during my article, Communicating crisis: Lessons learned in conducting field research among Native American populations, discussion. The study reported 10 methodological lessons learned from conducting culturally-sensitive, community-based crisis communication research with underrepresented populations.    I thought this crisis would be appropriate to evaluate how these methods could be implemented.

 

Information Vacuum

 

The ethics committee declined to respond to questions about the racial disparity, and members of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) are wary of talking about it on the record. But privately, some black members are outraged — and see in the numbers a worrisome trend in the actions of ethics watchdogs on and off Capitol Hill.

The ethics committee decision to remain quiet about the situation allows for key stakeholders and critics to comment and speculate about the committee’s true motives. A short statement outlining the reasons why they are investigating the selected members would justify their actions and would leave less space for speculation. But in this void people are talking.

“Is there concern whether someone is trying to set up [CBC] members? Yeah, there is,” a black House Democrat said. “It looks as if there is somebody out there who understands what the rules [are] and sends names to the ethics committee with the goal of going after the [CBC].”

A document leaked to The Washington Post last week showed that nearly three dozen lawmakers have come under scrutiny this year by either the House ethics committee or the Office of Congressional Ethics, an independent watchdog created in 2008 at the insistence of Pelosi. While the list contained a substantial number of white lawmakers, the ethics committee has not yet launched formal investigative subcommittees with respect to any of them — as it has with the seven African-American members. I find it hard to believe that even with this new public development the OCE still refuses to comment on the situation. Their silent tactic is just elongated the crisis life span. If a statement was issued then journalists might be less inclined to pursue any more information.  But the crisis continues as old issues are being intertwined with present ones.

The OCE has also been a particular target of ire for the Congressional Black Caucus. Black lawmakers, including CBC Chairwoman Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), met with OCE officials earlier this year to raise their concerns.

A number of CBC members opposed the resolution establishing the OCE, arguing that it was the wrong response to the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal, which helped Democrats seize control of the House in 2006.

Setting up the OCE “was a mistake,” Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-Mo.) told The Hill newspaper recently. “Congress has a long and rich history of overreacting to a crisis.”

Understand that Building Relationships Take Time

 

African-American politicians have long complained that they’re treated unfairly when ethical issues arise. Members of the Congressional Black Caucus are still fuming over Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s decision to oust then-Rep. William Jefferson (D-La.) from the House Ways and Means Committee in 2006, and some have argued that race plays a role in the ongoing efforts to remove Rep. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) from his chairmanship of that committee.  These recent actions by the House ethics committee are sure to add fuel to the fire and in the absence of an ethics committee statement will continue to grow out of control.

Recognize the Value of Multicultural Research Teams

 

The article focuses on research teams but I think that this concept can be applied for any group or team evaluating any multicultural demographic, which in America is often. The committee — which has one African-American lawmaker, Rep. G.K. Butterfield (D-N.C.), among its 10 members — considered three referrals from the recently formed Office of Congressional Ethics. It dismissed a case against Rep. Sam Graves (R-Mo.), who is white, but agreed to open full-blown investigations of California Democratic Reps. Maxine Waters and Laura Richardson, both of whom are black.  The committee was already investigating five other African-Americans. Rangel is the subject of two different probes, one involving a host of issues he has put before the committee and another involving allegations that corporate funds may have been used improperly to pay for members’ trips to the Caribbean in 2007-08. Reps. Carolyn Kilpatrick (D-Mich.), Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) and Donald Payne (D-N.J.) and Del. Donna Christensen (D-U.S. Virgin Islands) are also included in the second of those investigations.

Realize that Perceptions of Risk and Crisis Vary Across Cultures

 

Another CBC member said black lawmakers are “easy targets” for ethics watchdog groups because they have less money — both personally and in their campaign accounts — to defend themselves than do their white colleagues. Campaign funds can be used to pay members’ legal bills. 

“A lot of that has to do with outside watchdog groups like [Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington] that have to have a level of success to justify OCE,” the CBC member said. The good-government groups were strong backers of the OCE’s creation.

But these same groups won’t go after Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.), this lawmaker claimed, “because she has plenty of money to defend herself,” and the outside groups don’t want to take a risk. The Democrat said the ethics committee would be going up against Harman’s lawyers and “going up against” the powerful American Israel Public Affairs Committee if they push the OCE to pressure the ethics committee to act.

Harman was allegedly recorded on a 2005 federal wiretap discussing with an Israeli operative her bid to become Intelligence Committee chairwoman. Harman has denied any wrongdoing, but an attempt by the ethics committee to get a transcript of the taped call was rebuffed by the Justice Department.

What especially galled black lawmakers was that the ethics committee voted to move forward with the Waters and Richardson probes following the OCE referrals, while Graves — who OCE also thought should be investigated by the ethics committee — saw his case dismissed.

Even worse, the ethics committee issued a 541-page document explaining why it wouldn’t look into allegations that Graves invited a witness to testify before the Small Business Committee — on which he sits — without revealing his financial ties to that witness.  The ethics committee is willing to issue an in depth document explaining why it dropped charges against a suspect but won’t issue a statement to defend their current actions. “It is kind of crazy,” said an aide to one senior black Democrat. “How can it be that the ethics committee only investigates African-Americans? It doesn’t make sense.”

White lawmakers have certainly been the subject of ethics committee investigations before. Former Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas) was admonished by the committee for his dealings with corporate lobbyists, while ex-Rep. Mark Foley (R-Fla.) was the target of an investigation over his dealings with teenage male House pages in late 2006. Foley resigned after the sex scandal was revealed.

And the document leaked to the Post last week shows that a number of white lawmakers — including senior House Appropriations Committee members John Murtha (D-Pa.), Pete Visclosky (D-Ind.), Alan Mollohan (D-W.Va.) and Jim Moran (D-Va.) — have drawn the attention of the committee and the OCE.

The two congressional ethics watchdogs are looking into these members’ ties to the PMA Group, a now-defunct lobbying firm that won tens of millions of dollars in earmarks from members of the Appropriations Committee. The lawmakers who arranged for the earmarks received hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from PMA’s lobbying clients.

But it seems unlikely that the PMA case will become the subject of a full-blown ethics committee investigation. The Justice Department is also looking into the PMA allegations; the FBI raided PMA’s office last year, and Visclosky and his former chief of staff have been served with document subpoenas. And under ethics committee rules, the panel cannot conduct an investigation of any member or staffer already being probed by a law enforcement agency.

The nation’s only black senator, Roland Burris of Illinois, is currently under investigation by the Senate Ethics Committee. It’s not clear whether that committee is currently investigating any white members, although Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.) is likely to be in its sights if the Justice Department doesn’t pre-empt a committee investigation.

Conclusion

 

Obviously my main concern with this crisis is the committee’s choice to remain silent on the subject, especially since they have issued statements in the past to justify their actions. This crisis makes me ask several questions.

What does this say about the committee?

How does it make them look?

Do they think they don’t have to issue a statement becasue they are dealing with a minority in the population?

Are they refusing to recognize this crisis? Or are they unaware that this is a crisis? Does answering yes to either one of those questions make them look less out of touch?

With all situations in D.C. this is political. But I think this crisis raises issues that the committee are not ready to address and could silence with an explanation. Don't get me wrong, if these lawmakers are guilty of ethically compromising decisions they should be punished but I think along with others that it appears to be too much of a coincidence to be digested without some type of response.

It has been two weeks after the Fort Hood tragedy which costs the life of 13 people. Such crisis is extremely salient given the general social, political fact that (1) President Obama is expected to make a long-awaited announcement on his Afghan war strategy in the late November in an attempt to bring an end to a prolonged period of uncertainty surrounding US intentions; (2) he is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize which is viewed by him as a “call to action.” The inherent contradictory between war and peace posit the director actors—the US military, in a controversial and sensitive situation which is considering: add or cut military budget, increase or withdraw troops, enhance or weaken overseas military base influences to local community. At the same time, the president should make sure that every soldier’s right and welfare is taken care of so as keep the morale and support within the military field. Therefore, the response of the Whitehouse to this crisis is extremely important, and, to some extent, is triggering event of a chain of strategies that influence the future global influence of the United States

I have tracked the Whitehouse official press release, briefing, and address scripts of Fort Hood crisis from Nov 5 (the day shooting happened) to Nov 18, in order to investigate the crisis response strategies the Whitehouse used, and imply some of the highlights that may be helpful in our future CMP making. I recommend the readers, if time permits, to go through the message analytical table at the end of this post first, before going to my conclusion.

Key Stakeholders

1.  President Obama and his government/agency officers (representing the government, Military, and the whole American people)
2. Victims and their families
3. Military related stakeholders: soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines, and coast guardsmen, and the military families who love and support them.

Type of the Crisis

According to current evidence, this crisis can be categorized as a Malevolence—when some outside actor or opponent employs extreme tactics to attack the organization, such as product tampering, kid-napping, terrorism, or computer hacking. But as mentioned by Defense Secretary Rober Gates “It is prudent to determine immediately whether there are internal weaknesses or procedural shortcomings in the department that could make us vulnerable in the future,” whether there are some other causes, it is hard to tell.

Highlights of the Crisis Response Strategy and Tactics

Since Fort Hood crisis is a crisis of the US military, a state machine, rather than a normal profit or non-profit organization. Its stakeholder scope and interest party complexity are with much more magnitude. So the crisis response strategy toolkit based on a single theoretical origin, whether of Benoit’s Image Restoration theory, or Coombs’ Situation Crisis Communication Theory, is not enough to cover such complexity. I will integratedly use both and adding some identification theory from rhetoric field as my analytic framework.       

Nov 5 acute crisis stage

·       Showing the compassion immediately, e.g., “my immediate thoughts and prayers”;

·       Acknowledging the uncertainties but inform the public the credible sources of information and follow up actions;

·       Promising the corrective action, e.g., “to ensure that Fort Hood is secure”

Nov 6-9 information vacuum stage  

·       Strengthening the compassion by taking specific action— “So from now until Veterans Day I've ordered the flags at the White House and other federal buildings to be flown at half-staff”;

·       Acknowledging the uncertainties but indicating the credible sources, and warning not to jump to conclusion e.g. “We don't know all the answers yet and I would caution against jumping to conclusions until we have all the facts.”

·       Transcendence (as a bolstering strategy). To transcendent the victim soldiers to the overall military, the spirit of those victims to the overall patriot and self-sacrifice of the people serving for military, e.g., “This is a modest tribute to those who lost their lives even as many were preparing to risk their lives for their country.”

·       Cautiously scapegoating and indirectly blame of gunman. Due to the uncertainty of the case, the Whitehouse was aware that the harsh Scapegoating tactic may lead the public to link this crisis to terrorism within military which would be intolerable in terms of the government and military’s performance. So the president stressed the seriousness of the crisis and its horrified results in order to indirectly blame the crime of the gunman.   

Nov 10-11 ceremonial events as bolstering strategy

·       Mix use of transcendence and identification to frame the fallen of victims with higher value of protecting freedom, self-sacrifice, patriotism, braveness. And then extend such good feature to the whole American military officers and soldiers. Using Memorial Service at Fort Hood event to bolster the victims and transcendent their spirit to higher values; using Veterans Day at Arlington National Cemetery, identify the victims with all military, to transcendent victims’ spirit to higher values then to the values of the whole military.

e.g., “Your loved ones endure through the life of our nation. Their memory will be honored…. every moment that an American enjoys life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness -- that is their legacy.”

“You may remember the stories of a grandfather who marched across Europe; an uncle who fought in Vietnam; a sister who served in the Gulf.”

·       Bolstering by using humanistic stories, quotes, and anecdotes of victims to accentuate the victims’ remarkable features from their usual soldier lives.

e.g., “He said the last time he spoke to Justin, he told him how proud he was.  And he later said, ‘That's what I said to him every time I saw him -- that I loved him and I was proud of what he was doing.’  He said, ‘I can carry that around in my heart.’”

“Neither this country -- nor the values upon which we were founded -- could exist without men and women like these 13 Americans.  And that is why we must pay tribute to their stories.”

·       Bolstering (ingratiation) through heroism—promoting heroes and heroines who act bravely to the crisis and save people’s lives. Since these people are either soldiers or police, such good deed can be identified to all other military soldiers which results in the bolstering effects. e.g. “As was already mentioned, in those terrible minutes during the attack, soldiers made makeshift tourniquets out of their clothes. They braved gunfire to reach the wounded, and ferried them to safety in the backs of cars and a pickup truck.”

"…my own personal safety wasn't really what mattered to me…making sure that my battle buddies were safe," she said, "that was my number one priority."

Nov 12-18 “information unfolding stage”

One week after the crisis is the critical point for dealing with information vacuum, since at this time, the prolonged uncertainty may lead to rumor spreading. In this stage, the strategy focuses more on the gradually unfolding the truth.

·       Indicate the specific and credible resources, avoid any speculations. e.g., “The results of this inventory and review, as well as any recommendations for improvements to procedures and practices, shall be provided to John Brennan, Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism, who will serve as the principal point of contact on this matter for the White House.” 

·       Set up the preliminary results disclosure deadline. e.g. “Preliminary results of this review shall be provided by November 30, 2009”

·       Attach the accusers for dealing with rumors or irresponsible speculations. e.g., “I know there will also be inquiries by Congress, and there should.  But all of us should resist the temptation to turn this tragic event into the political theater that sometimes dominates the discussion here in Washington. The stakes are far too high.”

Implications to Future CMP

1. Listen to, acknowledge and respect the fears, anxieties, and uncertainties of public and key stakeholders
2. Focus on what is known and not known
3. Tell people what follow-up actions will be taken if a question cannot be answered immediately, or tell people where to get additional information
4. Offer authentic statements and actions that communicate compassion, conviction and optimism
5. Be honest, candid, transparent, ethical, frank, and open
6. Avoid guessing—check and double check the accuracy of facts
7. Regular updates of information
8. First-hand information
9. Human interest stories

Nov 5-18 the Whitehouse Response to Fort Hood Crisis

jpg file    excel file

Purdue is University is currently experiencing controversy over a tenured professor’s blog posting. Could this situation turn into an image crisis for Purdue? The professor, Bert Chapman, maintains his own blog, Conservative Librarian, on an independent website (Jaschik, 2009; McFeeley, 2009; “Purdue students protest,” 2009). Though his blog discloses his affiliation with Purdue, it also notes that his opinions are his own and do not represent Purdue. According to Inside Higher Ed, Chapman

… cites the billions spent on fighting AIDS “without recognizing the morally aberrant sexual behavior ... causing its spread” and the “sad practice” of colleges and other employers offering domestic partner benefits in a way that “prevents them from providing additional coverage to those of us adhering to traditional sexual moral standards”; he goes on to say that gay people are causing economic problems in fields such as real estate and divorce law. (Jaschik, 2009)

Purdue students, and some faculty, responded angrily, calling for Chapman’s dismissal or resignation because of his intolerant views (Jaschik, 2009; McFeeley, 2009). A day-long, organized protest took place on Purdue’s campus on November 11. The protest’s description on Facebook urged students to join in order to “Prof. Bert Chapman’s academic dishonesty and unprofessional mistreatment of students and faculty. Stop by to say you believe that this attack on the community and on Purdue’s reputation is unacceptable” (“Protest against,” 2009). Kevin Casimer, one of the leaders of the protest against Chapman, is urging the university to respond “more forceful[ly]” (Jaschik, 2009). Purdue has kept their official responses to a minimum, noting through spokesperson Jeanne Norberg,

The university has a policy prohibiting harassment if it unreasonably affects a person’s educational or work opportunities or affects his or her ability to participate in a university activity. This does not meet that standard. The First Amendment clearly allows him to state his opinion. The best response is to speak up, which is exactly what our students and some faculty are doing. (quoted in Jaschik, 2009)

Though it looks as though Purdue will not censure or take other adverse action against Chapman, he has called in the Foundation for Individual Rights in Educational (FIRE), a group known for defending the free speech rights of politically conservative academics—just in case.

Did Purdue make the right call in keeping their responses neutral and minimal? Did their responses avert an image crisis, or is a potential crisis still brewing? It may be too early to tell, as the controversy is recent and the situation is still developing. A search of Purdue’s website using the terms “bert chapman” and “bert chapman blog” failed to turn up any official Purdue response to the controversy. News media accounts of the controversy quote the same statements by Norberg quoted above; it appears this might be the only official statement Purdue has made. Coombs (2007) notes that in evaluating a crisis response, one of the key things to look at is the duration of media coverage. Organizations that can reduce the newsworthiness of a crisis help shorten the lifecycle of the crisis. In this regard, Purdue’s limited statement, which balanced the right of Chapman to make his statements with the right of students to respond to them, may have reduced the newsworthiness of the crisis. Norberg’s statement deflects attention from the university by painting Purdue as a bystander to the crisis rather than the site of it. This response is not easily classified into the response frameworks of Situational Crisis Communication Theory (SCCT) (Coombs, 2007) or Benoit’s typology of image restoration strategies (Zhang & Benoit, 2004). The statement could be considered an excusing response (per SCCT) or an evasion of responsibility (Benoit’s typology): Purdue has a policy in place regarding professors’ speech, that policy was followed, and therefore there’s nothing more the school can do. However, Norberg’s statement to the media doesn’t seem to be an intentional response strategy, because Purdue apparently doesn’t perceive the controversy to be a crisis, given their limited attention to it.

Yet many Purdue stakeholders clearly perceive the situation to be a crisis, at least in terms of its potential for damaging the school’s reputation. As one Purdue student noted on her own blog, “I’m seriously disappointed that such an ignorant and homophobic piece could be written by a professor here at Purdue. It makes me ashamed to also call myself a Boilermaker” (quoted in McFeeley, 2009). Alumni may feel the same way; if they withhold donations because they disagree with Purdue’s (in)action in this crisis, the school could suffer financial damage.

Regardless of whether Purdue perceives the Chapman blog controversy to be a full-blown crisis, I would encourage them to assess its impact, because they may learn some valuable lessons that could inform their response the next time a free speech controversy erupts. (And there will definitely be a next time—such controversies appear in higher education trade publications like Inside Higher Ed and The Chronicle of Higher Education nearly every week.)  To allow time for full fall-out from the crisis, I would recommend Purdue assess its impact six months from now. Per Coombs’s (2007) recommendations, they will need to look at:

1.       Financial impact. Did donations from alumni and others drop immediately after the crisis? Did undergraduate and graduate student applications drop? (This crisis occurred at the time of year when high school seniors are applying to college and it may have affected their decision to apply or not apply to Purdue; ditto graduate students.) 
2.          Reputational impact. What comments did Purdue receive from alumni about the crisis? From current students? Parents? Applicants? If Purdue conducts opinion surveys or other reputational measures, they should compare data six months before and six months after the crisis, looking at month-to-month (or even week-to-week, if possible) changes in that year-long period. In addition, Purdue should find a way to assess stakeholders’ satisfaction with their response to this event. Purdue administrators may be reluctant to do talk to stakeholders about the controversy, for fear of re-igniting it. Yet the data they would gain might prove to be extraordinarily valuable the next time a similar crisis erupts—and the damage could be more serious next time. If they know now how stakeholders would like them to handle crises of this type, they can incorporate that information into their crisis response plan.
3.       Media impact. They will also need to evaluate media coverage of the occurrence. They should not only look at news media accounts, but also blogs and websites. How was the university portrayed in media accounts about the event—favorably, unfavorably, neutrally? How often did the university’s official statement on the matter, as given by Jeanne Norberg, appear in media accounts? What did stakeholders quoted in the media say about Purdue and its response? How long did the media cover this event?

In sum, the controversy over Purdue professor Bert Chapman’s anti-gay blog may prove to be a relatively minor crisis, in term of its impact on the university—only time will tell if it blows over quickly or turns into a prolonged issue. Yet even if the impact is minimal, Purdue should not miss the opportunity to gain valuable information about their handling of the crisis to inform their response to similar crises in the future. 

Sources:

Coombs, W. T. (2007). Ongoing crisis communication (2^nd ed.). Los Angeles: Sage.

Jaschik, S. (2009, November 13). Furor over anti-gay blog. Inside Higher Ed. Retrieved November 16, 2009 from http://www.insidehighered.com/layout/set/print/news/2009/11/13/purdue

McFeeley, D. (2009, November 12). Purdue professor’s blog post sparks debate. The Indianapolis Star. Retrieved November 16, 2009 from http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2009911120519

Protest against Prof. Chapman. (2009). Facebook event posting. Retrieved November 16, 3009 from http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=181483784472&ref=mf

Purdue students protest librarian’s blog post. (2009, November 12). The Chicago Tribune. Retrieved November 16, 2009 from www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-ap-in-purdue-bloggerpro,0,7732363.story

Zhang, J. & Benoit, W. L. (2004). Message strategies of Saudi Arabia’s image restoration campaign after 9/11. Public Relations Review, 30(2), 161-168.

Here’s a timely new item that I that was a very interesting example of implementing new crisis management procedures, utilizing institutional memory and using post-crisis as an attempt to control pre-crisis and prevent future crisis. Anticipating problems associated with Black Friday holiday shoppers, Wal-Mart issued highly circulated remarks on its 2009 crisis prevention strategy.

 

Last Year’s Crisis

During last Black Friday, hordes of consumers rushed into the store seeking electronic items being sold at a considerable discount. In their frenzy, the crowds at a Wal-Mart in Valley Stream stampeded over Jdimytai Damour, a temporary employee who was in their way. The man died from his injuries. After the death of Mr. Damour, Wal-Mart settled a case with the district attorney of Nassau County. Wal-Mart agreed to create a $400,000 compensation fund, give $1.5 million to social service programs, and offer 50 jobs to area high school students each year for three years.

 

After last year’s Black Friday fatality, Wal-Mart came under severe media and shareholder scrutiny.  Many consumers’ advocacy groups called Wal-Mart to task because many other chain-retailers, such as Best Buy and Target had been using crowd control strategies for several years to prevent such atrocities. Best Buy, for example, hands out tickets for limited sale items, limits the number of customers entering the store and sends staff to talk to people waiting on line, said Peter Conway, general manager of the Westbury Best Buy. Conway further highlights that simple measure such as showing up early while customers wait for the store to open, talking to them and reducing their anxiety about product availability makes a significant impact for crowd control. The industry as a whole had been aware of this issue for years, as Black Friday crowd have continued to growth. The evidence of prior industry awareness of this issue meant that Wal-Mart had a higher degree of negligence in the eyes of their shareholders.

 

However, the 2008 Wal-Mart fatality has created an even higher level of responsibility for large retailers across the industry this year. Many retailers have ratcheted up their Black Friday safety plans in light of last year's tragedy. For the first time, the National Retail Federation issued crowd management guidelines for special sales events.

 

While there was extended national coverage of the fatality, the impact which it had on Wal-Marts reputation is questionable. Wal-Mart past blows to its reputation and the negative reception it has had in several small towns has created a semi-permanent negative connotation for the retailer. However, the strength of their business model arguably over rides the negative reputation of associated with the store in the minds of consumers. It seems the Wal-Mart case may be similar to the ValueJet case we read in class. The enduring appeal of notably low cost services and goods, when paired with a some form of re-branding or corrective action, diminishes the life-span of the crisis as well has minimizing any negative reputation which arises from the incident.

 

Here is a video of the news coverage of the 2008 Black Friday incident. It’s interesting to hear the how the information vacuum effected these initial stories, the use of witness interviews in particular shed a negative light on the incident: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5S6UKRaM5fA

 

To get a sense of the magnitude of typical Black Friday crowds, check out this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZN2lgQwmd0

 

Here’s another video that’s a good representation of the coverage circulated after the event. It highlights the customer opinion about Wal-Mart’s negligence and stakeholder responses [The visual doesn’t match up with the audio – but the audio is still exceptionally interesting!]:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80xO01JV9yo

 

This Year’s Prevention Strategy

The Wal-Mart where the accident occurred last year has a taken more extreme measures than the rest of the national stores. Part of the Nassau Wal-Mart’s prevention strategy focuses on collaborative efforts with the Nassau County Police. The police commissioner Lawrence Mulvey said that their office has “reviewed the plans and are quite satisfied that they [Wal-Mart] have taken the necessary steps to prepare for holiday shopping," said Mulvey. "I think they are taking some of the best-practice ideas we came up with last year after the tragedy."

 

Nationally, Wal-Mart plans to address the issues of over-crowding and violence over high demand items by keeping the majority of its stores open for more than 24 hours beginning on Thanksgiving Day and will incorporate crowd-control measures on the holiday weekend to prevent a frenzied rush. Furthermore, the store will allow customers to begin to line up at different locations within the stores to wait for specific items to go on sale at 5 a.m. Friday. Wal-Mart also said it has incorporated into its nationwide planning for Black Friday some of the crowd management strategies negotiated with Nassau County district attorney's office last May after last year's trampling death of Jdimytai Damour. Many of Wal-Mart’s crowd-control strategies were the result of its settlement with the Nassau DA's office in May, when it negotiated an agreement to avoid criminal charges.

 

Besides explaining the sales process to customers, the steps include a crowd-management staff to maintain orderly entry into the store and placement of promotional or hot items throughout the store to ensure manageable customer traffic. To avoid the mad dash toward popular items, the store will have customers line up at product displays and treat them on a first come, first serve basis. Since Wal-Mart stores only have one entrance, making crowd control more difficult, workers will be stationed at the front of the store directing customers to the appropriate places.

 

Institutional Memory

This case could provide interesting insight into the functionality of institutional memory. Wal-Mart is clearly responding to the 2008 Black Friday crisis but it has only been a year since the event occurred. As mentioned in last week’s lecture, aspects of the post-crisis process are circular. That is to say that during post-crisis management and evaluation, an organization should resume pre-crisis activities, including environmental scanning, while continuing to monitor “end” of crisis. However in the case of Wal-Mart, the litigation and resultant restitution measures ordered by the courts calls into question how aware Wal-Mart’s management is about such processes.

 

Although they appear to be follow an optimal post-crisis and environmental scanning pattern, a significant portion of their preventative strategy was mandated upon them. Certain facts may indicate that the lessons from the 2008 Black Friday incident have not been fully incorporated into Wal-Marts crisis prevention strategies. The foremost indicator is that there have not been institutionalized changes to the lay-out of Wal-Mart stores.  Since one of the major problems during holiday shopping seasons is a single point of entry and exit, changes to the number of entry points, design of the entry ways, and layout of the store would minimize the potential for harm. However, these changes could adversely impact the profits of any given store and as such, seem not to viable aspects of the Wal-Mart crisis communication strategy. Since the crisis management strategy appears superficial, at least on some level, this further calls into question whether the changes have actually been incorporated into the company’s institutional memory.

 

Highly Publicized Prevention Strategy

One aspect of their prevention campaign that I find fascinating is the highly publicized prevention strategy. I am eager to see how this strategy will play out on Black Friday. If there are no incidences during this year’s holiday shopping, Wal-Mart will have a fantastic opportunity to claim their strategy is a success. However, if a customer or employee is harmed, then Wal-Mart will have additional liability, since they had identified the possible threat ahead of time. Moreover, I’m concerned that the highly publicized prevention strategy has created a negative framing effect. Because the public has been made more aware of the potential for harm, incidents what would have gone unreported in past years may be deemed news worthy. Similarly, customers may see this as an opportunity to seek out restitution for superficial or fabricated injuries. As Coombs mentions, “crisis managers should reduce, not increase, the newsworthiness of a crisis” and in this case publicizing their prevention strategy may have increased the newsworthiness of a potential crisis (2007: 159).

 

Prevention Strategies vs. Optimal Profitability

One of the most challenging aspects of constructing this crisis prevention plan has been the warring need between customer safety and the need to generate revenue this year. The economic crisis of last year left many chain retailers with low sale, negative profits and excess inventory of hot items. Retailers want to avoid a repeat of last Christmas when many were compelled to slice prices very aggressively just ahead of the holidays and continue deep and margin-crushing discounts into the new year because they had misjudged how deeply the recession was goring consumers. Average holiday spending this year will be around $682.74, off 3% from $705.01 last year, the National Retail Federation predicts. Additionally, the calendar gives less time for buying between Black Friday and Christmas, so the race is on. The same holds true for the Monday after Thanksgiving, known as Cyber Monday, when online buying usually starts its holiday spurt.

 

It will be interesting to watch this one play out! I’ll post updates if anything notable happens after Turkey Day.

 

Sources:

http://www.newsday.com/long-island/nassau/li-black-friday-death-spurs-24-hour-wal-marts-1.1580985

http://www.kansascity.com/news/consumer_news/story/1564219.html

http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20091111-714806.html

http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssConsumerGoodsAndRetailNews/idUSN1136668920091111

http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/11/11/business/econwatch/entry5613015.shtml

http://www2.nbc4i.com/cmh/news/local/article/Are_You_Ready_For_Holiday_Shopping_Some_Consumers_Say_No_Way/26468/

 

 

Hello All

(this is basically an update on my last blog about Maclaren's crisis. As a comment needs to be less than 1000 characters to be allowed I am having to write this up as a new entry).

Even as we move on to discuss other crisis cases on this blog the Maclaren crisis is drawing more attention from independent thinkers, crisis communicators, media, bloggers and business schools.

 A revelation from Farzad Rastegar, the chief executive of Maclaren exposes how the organization was caught unprepared when the news of the stroller recall was leaked in the media a day prior the schedule. (This New York Times article carries excerpts from the Chief Exec. interview: http://parenting.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/11/13/maclaren-stroller-update/ )

This suggests an important aspect of crisis planning: having systems in place which could prevent critical information leak as that can lead to a lot of panic, system failures and general mismanagement as observed in this case.

The Harvard Business Review provides some useful suggestions regarding product recall crisis that could be of interest to us. So here is the link to it: http://blogs.harvardbusiness.org/hbr/hbreditors/2009/11/advice_to_maclaren_and_other_p.html?cm_re=homepage-061609-_-lede-_-headline  

 

From Jeff:

Some of the cases we've discussed this semester involve defective
products.  The US Consumer Product Safety Commission is responsible for
providing recall information.  http://www.cpsc.gov/

Note the "Especially for Kids" link.  What additional responsibilities do
you think a company has for providing recall/crisis information when a
delicate population such as children (or the elderly) are involved?

An example would be the indirect nature of communication through one's
caregiver (e.g., a parent).

From Jeff:

A recurring topic during our in-class discussion is determining the
appropriate degree of honesty that should be demonstrated during crisis
communication.

Rather than providing the insightful "It depends." response, I wanted to
recommend an article for qualifying different types of lying.

Levashina, J. & Campion, M.A. (2007). Measuring Faking in the Employment
Interview: Development and Validation of an Interview Faking Behavior
Scale.  Journal of Applied Psychology, 92 (6), 1638-1656.

This article provides a useful taxonomy for classifying deceptive
behaviors and differentiates between faking, social desirability, and
impression management within the context of an employment interview.

Through a series of studies and factor analyses, 4 factors and 11
subfactors were identified:

1. Slight image creation:  to make an image of a good candidate for the job

1a. Embellishing: to overstate of embellish answers beyond a reasonable
description of the truth
1b. Tailoring: to modify or adapt answers to fit the job
1c. Fit Enhancing: to create the impression of a fit with the job or
organization in terms of beliefs, values, or attitudes)

2. Extensive image creation: to invent an image of a good candidate for
the job
2a. Constructing: to build stories by combining or arranging work
experiences to provide better answers
2b. Inventing: to cook up better answers
2c. Borrowing: to answer based on the experiences or accomplishments of
others

3. Image Protection: to defend an image of a good candidate for the job)
3a. Omitting: to not mention some things in order to improve answers)
3b. Masking: to disguise or conceal aspects of background to create better
answers)
3c. Distancing: to improve answers by separating from negative events or
experiences)

4. Ingratiation: to gain favor with the interviewer to improve the
appearance of a good candidate for the job
4a. Opinion Conforming: to express beliefs, values, or attitudes held by
the interviewer or organization
4b. Interviewer or Organizational Enhancing: to insincerely praise or
compliment the interviewer or organization

These authors discovered, for example, a relationship between faking
behaviors during an interview and likelihood of receiving a second
interview or job offer.  While this finding may be somewhat alarming, it
is not surprising, given the documented inability of human beings to
detect deceit.

From Jeff:

Top Ten Legal Facets to a Crisis
http://www.bernsteincrisismanagement.com/nl/crisismgr050115.html#jat

Who is a crisis communicator within your organization?
http://www.bernsteincrisismanagement.com/docs/its_an_inside_job_internal_crisis_communications.html

 

Crisis at Maclaren:

With ‘safety at its heart’ recalls baby strollers only in the U.S.

 

Maclaren a forty two year old leading British lifestyle company which prefers to describe itself as ‘the world’s most safe producer of baby buggies and strollers’ is however, finding itself in a disgraceful situation at present. So far fifteen cases of child injuries in the U.S. have been reported with 12 babies suffering finger tip amputation when their fingers were clasped between the strollers’ hinges. Maclaren is recalling all nine models of umbrella strollers that it sold from 1999 to November 2009. Perhaps, this case is unique for the time span that the products being recalled cover. This recall of around 1 million strollers is curiously restricted to the U.S. market though the same models are sold in other countries too as I discovered while looking through the dedicated websites for each country. The organization’s website also announces issuing to all U.S. customers a free repair kit that conceals the dangerous hinges.

Details about the recall can be found on Maclaren’s website: http://recall.maclarenbaby.com/

 

While Maclaren in its recall information emphasizes its commitment to consumer safety and the act of ‘voluntary recall’ with issuing of free repair kits; the regulatory body U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission has issued a press release on November 9^th ’09 jointly with the organization stating that consumers should immediately stop using the recalled models. The CPSC press release is available on the following link:

http://www.cpsc.gov/cpscpub/prerel/prhtml10/10033.html

 

Analyzing Maclaren’s Initial Crisis Response and Strategies 

 

                 It is shocking that products made available to consumers by the organization for the past ten years have remained unsafe through this long period. A TIME magazine article quotes a disgruntled parent on a blog pointing to the callous approach of the organization which needed fingers of at least 12 toddlers to be amputated before it announced a recall. The time lag perhaps also indicates a lack of sufficient monitoring on the part of the CPSC.  

http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1937003,00.html?xid=yahoo-feat

 

                 Clearly Maclaren in its crisis communication has missed the bus on responding quickly to the warning signs and risks (which seem to run back ten years in this case). Coombs’ (2007) another advice on initial crisis response is regarding the expression of empathy. The crisis communication team at Maclaren seems to be occupied with  bolstering its position instead of expressing sympathy for the affected consumers. This is only helping in lengthening the crisis life cycle as more consumers express their despair and anger through both traditional and social media.

  

                Lerbinger(1997) and Pauchant & Mitroff (1992) classify a product recall prompted by a technical error by the organization as a technical crisis and in such cases the organization needs to express ownership and responsibility.  However, while Maclaren is opting for a rebuilding strategy as described by Coombs (2006) by offering free kits to ‘affected consumers’ to correct the design error, nowhere in its announcements and website does the organization express any kind of apology to its stakeholders.  The organization perhaps under legal compulsions is shying away from a full apology, yet it is possible to express empathy towards affected stakeholders without accepting complete blame. Parents at the moment are engaging in expressing their disbelief for the organization, a mother blogged on http://motherloadshow.blogspot.com/ asking “is there nothing safe?”

 

               The organization in its recall message is also employing a bolstering posture by reminding stakeholders, “Maclaren USA's Umbrella Strollers meet all U.S. ASTM & JPMA compliance standards. These certifications guarantee our umbrella strollers meet the maximum safety standards available. The voluntary recall is to alert the operator when opening or closing the stroller of the possible risk of injury”.

 

              Intriguingly there is a similarity between the strategies being employed by Maclaren and those used by Mercedez in its A-Class crisis communication twelve years back as Mercedez too undertook corrective actions along with a bolstering approach without providing an apology. However it should be mentioned here that consumers and public opinion in general is far more critical of an organization that deals with baby products than cars.

Maclaren’s Message (or absence of it) to Consumers in Other Countries

              While Maclaren baby strollers are sold in over fifty countries around the world the recall has been announced only in the U.S. A CNN news item mentions that the European arm of the company has announced no recall since fewer injuries were reported in spite of higher sales. http://www.cnn.com/2009/BUSINESS/11/10/stroller.recall.maclaren/index.html

              While there is some information addressing the concerns of European consumers, the organization has chosen to avoid consumers in rest of the nations. With social media buzzing with this news it is unlikely that the information would be restricted within certain parts of the world. It will be important here to mention that while the TIME magazine piece written on November 9th found 5000 results on a Google search with the terms “Maclaren fingertip amputation” the same search terms drew 17,800 results on November 11^th morning and a humungous 42,400 results when I carried out the search once again in the evening on the same date. Definitely stakeholders are communicating frantically among themselves using the social media in addition to the news sites tracking the developments on the story. Not surprisingly a number of blogs are dedicated to legal advice to parents who may decide on a legal recourse against Maclaren. The following link is an example of a legal blog:

http://www.massachusettsinjurylawyerblog.com/2009/11/maclaren-recalls-one-million-s.html

                     Is it going to be a matter of time when regulatory bodies in other countries also persuade Maclaren to take action? And how would that affect the reputation of the organization that is exhibiting only reactive moves instead of proactive ones which should be expected from an organization of this stature.

Some Crisis Evaluation Indicators:

                    Maclaren’s crisis at this point is far from its resolution. In fact its crisis communication strategies as analyzed above are prone to stretch the crisis life cycle. However in an initial attempt to gauge the media’s position on this crisis, I analyzed the headlines of news items on the first 20 pages that came up on a Google search with the search terms ‘Maclaren strollers recalled’.  Among the sample analyzed around 60-65% of the news items bear the organization name and the words ‘finger amputation’ in its heading. This does indicate that the initial response at least from the media has been to ascribe blame to Maclaren by directing associating the organization name with harm caused to consumers. Obviously this should not be evaluated as the opinion of stakeholders. Analysis of blogs posted by consumers could be a source of gaining data for understanding stakeholder opinion through the new media.

                    Interestingly, Maclaren carries the tagline, ‘What a mother wants, what a baby needs’. It would be useful to analyze if the ethos of this tagline can emerge unscathed once this crisis reaches its resolution.

 

 

Fairbanks Farm Beef Recall

Link to the story: http://www.newsobserver.com/news/nation_world/story/171398.html

Link to original press release from Fairbank Farms: http://www.fairbankfarms.com/press_release103109.htm

Link to release sent out by USDA: http://www.fairbankfarms.com/059%20%20NY%20E%20%20coli%2010%2031%2009%20FINAL.pdf

 

This story was released in the News and Observer on November 2, 2009. The story is about the beef recall that Fairbanks Farm experienced recently. There is a link to the original press release sent out by Fairbanks Farm on October 31, 2009. The release was sent out after they realized the beef may be contaminated with E coli.  There have allegedly been two deaths and 16 hospitalizations that have resulted from digestion of the bad meat.  Fairbanks Farm has voluntarily recalled roughly 546,000 pounds of beef that were distributed in September in stores from North Carolina to Maine.

This is a particularly interesting case, because as Coombs (2007) indicates, Fairbanks Farms has just experienced the trigger event of the crisis and they are now in the second stage of the crisis life cycle, which is the crisis event. There are two stages to the crisis event which are recognition of the crisis and containment of the crisis. Fairbanks Farm has recognized that they are having a crisis, and now they need to focus on the containment of the crisis and they need to attempt to shorten the crisis life cycle.

With that being said, there are several aspects of this crisis that I want to examine. First, I will look at the crisis response strategies that have been utilized by Fairbanks Farm in the initial stage of the crisis. This will include looking at the Fairbanks Farm controlled tool, a website, which they have utilized for the purposes of this crisis. Then, I will assess how Fairbanks Farm can begin rebuilding their reputation so they can move forward past this crisis.

Coombs (2007) explains that crisis response strategies are important for two reasons. The first reason is to stop the crisis from spreading to “unaffected areas of the organization or environment” (Coombs, 2007, p. 127). The second reason crisis response strategies are important during a crisis is to “limit the duration” of a crisis life cycle (Coombs, 2007, p. 127). The overarching goal of the Fairbanks Farm crisis response strategy so far has been to reduce any uncertainty for their stakeholders.

Fairbanks Farm has taken several actions to reach this goal. First, it seems that Fairbanks Farm did not hesitate to release information about the recall and how consumers could identify the infected meat, and get their money back for the meat. This was a good move by Fairbanks Farms because as Coombs (2007) indicates, a quick response to a crisis is helpful for the organization because if they don’t supply information to the media than someone else will. Therefore, Fairbanks Farms was correct for responding quickly because they helped to ensure that “stakeholders receive accurate crisis-related information and hear the organization’s side of the story” (Coombs, 2007, p. 129). By taking control of the situation, Fairbanks Farm helped establish their credibility because silence is equated with uncertainty and a lack of control over the situation.  Fairbanks Farm has also delivered a consistent message across all media, which helps them establish credibility. This message has been their strong concern for their customers and their dedication to helping their customers during this time of crisis. One message from the CEO reflects this:

“Our current priorities are to inform the public and address their concerns. Further, we want to help them to identify and remove any of the recalled products that may be in their freezers,” said Ron Allen, CEO of Fairbank Farms (www.fairbanksfarm.com, 2009 ).

After looking at the website as Fairbanks Farm’s controlled tool, there are several interesting observations that I made. The website is interesting because all of the information on the website is directly related to the crisis. In fact, there is no other information on the site. When stakeholders go to the website they will be inundated with instruction information. The first page is the news article that was released in Albany, NY. There are also links to the original press release written by Fairbanks Farm. In addition, they have a link to the statement released by the USDA concerning the food recall. They also include the number to the USDA Meat and Poultry hotline. There is also an email address where stakeholders can send their questions and get them answered. There was even a place where media could go to get their questions answered. The press releases and the USDA statement clearly identify which stores released which products and how to identify the potentially contaminated products. The instruction information has helped the company reduce uncertainty for their consumers which helps their credibility.

Something that should be restated is that Fairbanks Farm voluntarily recalled these products. It has not been determined if the beef is the cause of the E coli breakout, there is just a possible link between the two. Fairbanks Farm has taken corrective action even though they haven’t actually proven that their beef was infected with E coli. This was a very proactive approach to handling the crisis, which may have resulted in shortening of the crisis life cycle.

Because there has been no determination that the beef caused the sicknesses and deaths, the company has not apologized. They have insinuated their empathy towards consumers who were inconvenienced by the meat recall; however, there was no mention of the deaths and sickness that have been identified as a result of E coli on the websites or in the news article on their website. Potential reasons for the lack of mentioning this information on their website is their uncertainty of whether their meat was responsible for the E coli deaths. However, if it is proven that the meat led to the deaths and sickness of those people, than the appropriate crisis strategy should be apology.

Fairbanks Farm seems to be handling the crisis as effectively as possible based on the information I found on their website and the news articles that have been released about this beef recall. There may still be additional crisis strategies that need to occur in order to end the crisis and push the crisis into post-crisis. However, in the mean time Fairbanks Farm needs to begin to restore their reputation.

Depending on the results of the E coli test, the organization can begin to rebuild their credibility and reputation in several ways. It seems that the organization has already begun to implement rebuilding strategies. They have provided compensation for anyone who purchased this bad meat. The company may choose to issue a formal apology when and if they determine that their meat was the reason for two deaths and 16 ill consumers. It appears that the organization is taking the correct actions to reduce their crisis life cycle. This crisis may play out differently in the weeks to come, but if they take quick and decisive actions to reduce uncertainty and provide stakeholders with information, they should shorten their life cycle and move on to the post-crisis stage.

After weeks of taking the hit, AT&T finally responded with a lawsuit against Verizon for its misleading advertising concerning AT&T wireless service. In the ads "There Is A Map For That", although Verizon put a tiny line underneath its slogan saying "Comparison based on square miles covered with 3G. Voice and data services available outside 3G coverage area", it is still very insignificant in front of AT&T's 'blank' coverage on the 'map'.

Introduction
Below is a link to Verizon's new ads:
1st Ad: (Samsung)
Description: Guy walks through campus with Verizon Wireless phone and plays Rock Band. Guy with AT&T phone doesn't have coverage so he can't use his apps.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0WIXFs_g728&feature=related
2nd Ad: (LG)
Description: Girl walks down street with Verizon Wireless phone. She uses Tweet Tweet and makes plans with friends. Girl with AT&T phone doesn't have 3G coverage so she misses the invite.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECF-tBIK6pw
3nd: Verizon 3G Website:
http://phones.verizonwireless.com/3g/
After getting the big picture of this argument, let's see how Verizon responded to AT&T and how these ads caused Verizon bigger problems.

1. Watch the language in media (e.g.ads):
In Verizon's earlier ads, it said that AT&T customers were "out of touch" where AT&T "3G" coverage is
not available. Besides, in the ads provided above, Verizon displayed a "3G" coverage map attributed to
AT&T with large blank areas (or no coverage) to bolster its misleading message that customers with AT&T service are "out of touch" in large parts of the US. This "out of touch" brought Verizon trouble with AT&T, which was the trigger event of this crisis.
Later, AT&T confronted with Verizon about its equivocal language in ads."By communicating that AT&T customers have no coverage in large parts of the country, Verizon is misleading the public about an essential component of the services AT&T offers," the lawsuit says. Verizon's company spokesperson Jim Gerace said to the Wall Street Journal that "the lawsuit doesn't have any merits. Our ads clearly explain that non-3G coverage is available elsewhere." What Gerace meant by "clearly" was actually a small line.
Verizon removed the words "out of touch" from the ads and replaced with the phrase "Voice & data services available outside 3G coverage areas" in small fonts at the end of the ads (did you see it in the ads above?). This was a bad PR move for three reasons. First off, it did not solve the problem since the fonts were too small for consumers to see. Secondly, it jeopardized its relationship with AT&T for not providing a valid solution. Last but not least, it dragged the crisis to a higher level. Therefore, Verizon's initial crisis response was a failure.

2. Suggested Best Practice
The recommended best practice for Verizon PR people would be: communicating with AT&T in a formal bi-lateral meeting to negotiate a solution. The relationship with competitors may be tricky, yet it is possible. Losing a lawsuit may cost Verizon hundreds of times more than the profits gained from its misleading ads.Their bad decision put Verizon at a very passive position. Verizon might have faced questioning of its reputation and credibility at any time.

3. Legal Consultant in CMT
Responding to a medium like Wall Street Journal is not a wise choice. No matter how terrible AT&T's network is, Verizon cannot set the fire.
The Lanham Act stated clearly that "in commercial advertising or promotion, misrepresents the nature, characteristics, qualities, or geographic origin of his or her or another person's goods, services or commercial activities, shall be liable in a civil action by any person who believes that he or she is or is likely to be damaged by such act."
Verizon's CMT should at least have several legal professionals who can figure out how to deal with these acts. In Verizon's CMP, risk assessment section should include certain legal issues concerning media releases such as TV commercials. Besides, Verizon needs to hold a CMT meeting with its legal professional present to talk about crisis responses.

4. What About Irreparable Loss of AT&T
Besides legal responses, Verizon CMT should also think about possible compensation for AT&T if the lawsuit actually resulted in a restraining order of the commercials and responsibility to AT&T's damages.
The crisis has been going on for a month since the new ads came to the public in October.Verizon have missed many chances to negotiate with AT&T for a better solution than confronting in court. The PR people in Verizon should take action to actively and pro-actively respond to the crisis through communication with AT&T or through mass media.

5. On AT&T's Side
For AT&T people, communicating with Apple is of the utmost importance. Verizon's commercials highly affect two groups of AT&T's stakeholders---consumers and collaborators. Social media provided the consumers and users a great platform to whine about AT&T's wireless service. Verizon reminded them to do so with the commercials.
AT&T needed to use bolstering strategies to ask for wide support from users, potential consumers, and last but not least, its biggest collaborator---Apple Iphone. Rumors said Apple might drop exclusivity with AT&T next year and would possibly collaborate with Verizon to extend carrier options for Iphone customers. AT&T's CMT needs to meet with Apple's decision makers, let them know about AT&T's current situation, and ask for support. It may be a good idea to talk about continuing the exclusivity and offering much 'leeway' for sharing profits.

Closing
It is a battle between AT&T and Verizon. It is also a war between the PR/crisis management team in the two companies. Whoever wins the media and stakeholdes will succeed eventually.

Infographic of the Day: China's Social Media Map

BY Noah Robischon Mon Oct 12, 2009 at 11:13 AM

The major players in the U.S. social media world can be counted on one hand: Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, LinkedIn. Not so in China, where the country's 300 million online users have a panoply of popular social networks to choose from--and Facebook doesn't even crack the top 10. This map of the Chinese social media landscape was created by the Shanghai-based social network marketing company Zero Degrees.

 

http://bx.businessweek.com/linkedin-and-business-social-networking/view?url=http%3A%2F%2Ftwurl.nl%2Fsw157h

This article was from Business Week and it provided PR professionals some interesting thoughts.
1. There is never a medium that works everywhere.
2. When an international crisis occurs, PR professionals need to take into account stakeholders in other countries and areas. From what we learn from class, organizations approach stakeholders and try to place a control over information flow by employing media with stakeholders' preferences. Therefore, if P & G has a crisis in the States as well as across the Pacific, PR professionals of P & G will have to use Chinese top traditional media and social media to approach the stakeholders from the other side of the planet.
3. Keep informed about social media development in different areas and countries in case a crisis happens internationally.
4. Facebook and other social media may think beyond providing multiple language versions of facebook. The important message needs to adapt to different cultures as well. So do PR professionals. Dealing with crises in the States and in China may be completely distinguished. Coorperation with local professionals may be a good way to settle crises.

LMK your thoughts!

 

On August 21, 2009, a Thai owned oil company PTTEP’s production well suffered a dramatic well-control accident. The accident occurred in an area known as the Montara Oil Field in the Timor Sea, more than 200km northwest of the Kimberley coastline, Australia. According to PTTEP, the well began pouring oil and gas into the Timor Sea at a rate of between 300 and 400 barrels a day, and three failed attempts have been made to plug the leaking well till Oct 22 (eight weeks) according to news.com.au, and a fourth attempt to plug the well has been delayed and will be made on Oct 28 according to Australia Network News, Oct 27, 2009.

Although compared with Exxon Valdez oil spill case, the leaking and polluting scale is much smaller in Montara case, several new features of this crisis in organization responses, stakeholder involvement, media coverage, and information strategy indicate that the crisis is going worse (for the leaking perhaps, but the organization is for sure).Urgent crisis management measures should be taken in order not to make this “small scale” crisis as notorious as Exxon Valdez case.  

Stakeholder Analysis: Out-of-Sight Out-of-Mind Syndrome is Brewing a Crisis Storm

Australia government and PTTEP Company: complacent to the issue

Power: both sides have the power (the former authorized the latter the right of offshore drill); Legitimacy: it has been questioned by Senator Brown: “West Atlas spill [this Montara spill] should force a reassessment of the proposed Gorgon gas project [another ongoing seadrill project] off the Pilbara coast,” given the current uncontrollable situation of Montara spill; Willingness to confront: since the leaking site is off the coast of Darwin, off the Northern Territory and Western Australia, and the area is also with scarce previous studies of marine life and with no baseline survey of the vulnerability of adjacent ecosystems or marine wildlife by the company or its predecessors, Australia government “is showing signs of complacency over the seriousness of the oil slick and the issues it might pose for marine life.” (Greg Hunt)

Media: lack of interests to a non-hot spot

Agenda setting role of media is apparent when comparing this case with Exxon Valdez spill. The out-of-sight out-of-mind syndrome appears in the major western media community, when dealing with Motara spill crisis. I have searched the news about Motara leak/PTTEP/Timor Sear spill in CNN, MSNBC, BBC, and NBC news site, there are very few reports about the crisis. Most of these sites just quote some of the PTTEP newsletter or government statement. On the contrary, the new media channels show more interests to this crisis, and report it through multimedia tools: Al Jazeera post an interview of WWF on Timor oil spill on Oct 24, 2009 on Youtube; guardian.co.uk hosts a online photo site monitoring the leaking. Australia Network news provides audio form of interview online. But in general, since the lacking of focus by major media community, Montara leak crisis is not listed into the public agenda. So it, to some degree, worsened the out-of-sight syndrome and makes the crisis signals more hidden until it blasts out some day.

Fisherman in Indonesia: lack of power to protect their rights

In contrast of the Alaska fishermen of Exxon Valdez case (facing the crisis caused by their own country company, with more comprehensive legal and regulation system as support, major media focus), the Indonesian fisherman seems powerless—lacking the ability to get the foreign organization (PTTEP) and foreign government (Australia government) to do something. Their rights are to some extent overlooked, although “they are worried the spill will come to their beaches in the next few days and they think the Australian authorities did not make any effort to prevent the oil from reaching their beach” (ABC rural news). Moreover, the Australia's Defence Minister John Faulkner denied the claim of Indonesian fishermen. "My understanding is that the oil spill is not in Indonesian territorial waters," he said. "I can say that, through the Department of Foreign Affairs, Indonesian authorities have been kept informed of the location of the residual oil sheen." (Australia network news Oct 28)

Environment protection organization: the only active party of the crisis

Compared to fishermen, the environment protection organizations are more powerful, and with stronger legitimacy and wiliness to confront:

1.     WWF conducted a biodiversity survey of the Montara spill, and post the full survey report on their official website. They linked this case to the Exxon Valdez spill and are concerned about the long term impacts of the spill to the marine life (upstreamonline.com).

2.     The Conservation Council of Western Australia has presented a petition with 6,500 thousand signatures to the Australian prime minister, calling for an inquiry into an oil spill in the Timor Sea. Tim Nicol from the Conservation Council says the petition calls for more protection for the marine environment (Australia network news Oct 28).

3.     Geoscience Australia and Greens call into question the PTTEP estimate of amount of oil leaking per day and its evaluation method (news.com.au).

Crisis Management Strategy Analysis: MUM Effect Hide the Brewing Crisis Strom 

Diminishing Posture

Compared with Exxon one of the leading oil company in the world, PTTEP is much smaller in scale and a local company. So the public’s emphases are mostly on Australia government. According to my observation, during the process so far, Australia government and PTTEP are adopting the same strategy dealing with Montara crisis—diminishing posture if not denial posture.

Environment Minister Peter Garrett is "missing in action" and has not commented publicly on the incident.

Resources and Energy Minister Martin Ferguson simply dismissed a major oil spill out of hand and were optimistic to another similar seadrill project when answering the concern of reassessment to the future project, he said “there's no way there'll be environmental problems with Gorgon [gas project].”

Infrastructure Minister Anthony Albanese says the Federal Government's response has been effective.

The MUM effect: facing inconsistent estimate of oil flow rate

The MUM effect is people in organizations have a tendency to withhold negative information completely (e.g., information that makes them look bad) or alter the information to make it less damaging (Stohl & Redding, 1987). It is reflected in Australia government dealing with information about the oil flow rate.

According to the official report from PTTEP, up until the 22 October 2009, the leak had been running for 62 days with estimates of 300-400 barrels per day leaking into the surrounding water, equivalent to about 4 million litres.

An independent analysis sourced by the Greens calculated the Montara wellhead could be leaking as much as 3000 barrels of oil a day.

Based on data from Geoscience Australia the flow could be about 2000 barrels a day, plus condensate.

These figures seem to determine how serious of this Montara spill case. If we take the 3000 barrels/day, from Aug 21 till now Oct 28: 69 days x 3000 barrels = 207000 barrels which is around 33 million liters of oil. Given the fact that the leaking is still undercontrol, with another 20-30 days, it will reach 40 million liters which is the amount of spill in Exxon Valdez case. In other words, within less than one month, Montara spill will overpass Exxon Valdez spill becoming the worst oil spill case in the world!!

Isn’t it a brewing crisis storm?!

However, Australia government did not, as a MUM effect, take every sides of opinions into account, or conduct a precise investigation to find out actual oil flow rate and evaluate the seriousness of the case, or provide strong evidence to eliminate people’s concern. They just, as summarized by Greens Senator Rachel Siewert, “chose to support the company's [PTTEP] estimates rather than the department's [Greens and Geoscience] estimates,” even though “PTTEP had failed to give the officials any basis for its calculations on the rate of the oil flow.”(news.com.au)

In summary, from the crisis communication perspective, I find several points:

A dilemma of “The stakeholders perceive it as the crisis, then it is the crisis.” Due to power, legitimacy and willingness to confront differences, sometimes not all the stakeholders’ rights are equally emphasized. E.g., government cares only about its own country’s benefit, major media agenda setting and non-setting. But the increasing vocal of those ignored stakeholder (e.g., Indonesian fisherman claim their rights through their government, International law suit, etc) will worsen the crisis

Information consistency does not solely mean speak in same voice, it also includes the integration and consensus of different sensemaking processes of different stakeholder groups. E.g., Australia government can hold public hearing of oil flow rate with WWF, Geoscience, Greeens, PTTEP and all other economic and social groups, to work out a estimate plan to get the precise oil leaking rate as well as objective crisis evaluation.

Always being aware of the MUM effect and take multiple perspectives of stakeholders. The social or economic attachment to the organization may easily lead the members to take the perspective of organization when making sense the crisis. Taking a multiple perspectives of stakeholders and being open to different voices are two ways of dealing with MUM effect.

The American Psychological Association (APA) produces the main style guide used by a range of fields, including communications, education, sociology, and of course, psychology. Most—maybe all—social science graduate students and faculty are well acquainted with the guide, officially known as Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, but often familiarly referred to as “the APA manual.” It is the stylistic bible for writing papers, theses and dissertations, and journal articles; failure to obey its commandments can result in lowered grades, re-writing, or even rejection of a manuscript.  No surprise, then, that many social science students and academics were outraged when the APA released an eight-page document with corrections to the text of the 6^th edition of the manual (published in July 2009).  While some of the corrections are of little significance, a substantial number correct typographical errors that violate or contradict the APA’s style guidelines (the full list of corrections is available at http://supp.apa.org/style/PM6E-1st-Printing-Reprint-Corrections.pdf). Consumers were irate and quickly took to the Internet to vent their anger and insist that the APA provide free replacement copies to everyone who purchased the error-laden 6^th edition.  However, the APA refused.  Mary Lynn Skutley, the editorial director for APA books, commented to one consumer, “I firmly believe that replacement of the first printing would be both unnecessary and wasteful” and directed that consumer toward the downloadable errata sheet on the APA’s website (Epstein, 2009).

To date, the manual has received seventeen 1-star reviews on Amazon (1 star representing the lowest possible rating), representing more than one-quarter of all reviewers.  Themes in consumers’ comments mention that the APA “should be ashamed” and deplore their “abuse of power”; call the manual “faulty and defective,” “useless,” and “worthless”; call for an apology from the APA; and urge other consumers not to buy the manual (http://www.amazon.com/Publication-Manual-American-Psychological-Association/product-reviews/1433805618/ref=cm_cr_pr_hist_1?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=0&filterBy=addOneStar). Reader comments on the Inside Higher Ed article about the errors (Epstein, 2009) expressed similar sentiments and also called for compensation from the APA, likening the 6^th edition of the manual to a defective product. 

The APA responded to the negative publicity on October 8, 2009 with a posting by Skutley on their organizational blog (Skutley, 2009). She noted that the APA “would like to clarify the nature and extent of the errors in the sixth edition and tell you how you can access the corrections online.” She emphasized that the errors were minor, the manual was accurate and reliable, and directed consumers toward the online corrections as well as free tutorials and other resources. She closed by thanking consumers for pointing out the errors and noting the speed of the APA’s response to correct them. This response by the APA was woefully insufficient in meeting consumer demands, and the manual continues to receive negative publicity on the Internet.  In addition, Skutley’s blog entry is easy to overlook; it is currently the fifth entry from the top of the page and will be pushed down further as new blog entries are added. Visually, nothing distinguishes it from blog entries on topics such as “How to cite a speech in APA style.” Consumers looking for this information will have a difficult time finding it. On the APA Style homepage (http://www.apastyle.org/), there is a link to a pdf of the 6^th edition corrections, but not to any message or information about the continuing controversy over the manual.

At issue here is the APA’s reputation: if consumers don’t believe the APA produces reliable publications—especially one that is as widely used as the manual—the APA’s overall reputation could suffer. Given the APA’s current position as the sole stylistic authority for so many academic fields, the current perceived credibility crisis could harm their reputation irreparably.  Consumers are a class of stakeholders; they are primary (that is, the organization exists at least in part to serve them) and external (meaning the organization cannot exert some direct control over them as it could with, for example, employees). Coombs (2007) notes that “how well an organization meets stakeholder expectations is a rough guide for determining if a reputation will be positive or negative” (p. 25). In the case of the 6^th edition of the manual, the APA has clearly failed to meet the expectations of their consumer stakeholders, a fact that the consumers have been very vocal about.  Coombs notes that consumers are more likely to turn to the Internet and other indirect sources of information rather than information that comes directly from the organization when forming an opinion about an organization’s reputation.  Thus, when organizations face a reputation crisis, they have an uphill battle ahead of them to make their message heard above the “noise” of indirect sources.

The APA was proactive in establishing an organizational blog through which consumers can find answers to FAQs concerning the manual; it was in this forum that Skutley posted the APA’s official response to the corrections crisis.  However, as mentioned previously, information about the correction to the manual is difficult to find on the APA blog. The lack of a clear and visible message from APA led consumers to seek information from each other—information that was often inflammatory and inaccurate—and also made the APA seem unresponsive and unconcerned about their “defective” product.  As Stephens and Malone (2009) note,

“As stakeholders [who are seeking information] follow…user-posted links, the veracity of the information becomes a major concern. ... there is likely no way an organization can control the extension of this linking process. This leads us to suggest that organizations must use the Web prior to a crisis to ensure that their stakeholders will go to [the organization’s] information sources first” (p. 238, emphasis added).

Had the APA used their organizational blog to address the brewing credibility crisis resulting from the errors in their manual—or, ideally, if they had engaged in effective reputational threat assessment (Coombs, 2007) and taken corrective action before consumers could become angry—they might have significantly diminished the reputational threat posed by this crisis.  Specifically, it would have behooved the APA to launch a separate blog to address the issue of the manual errors—Sweetser and Metzgar (2007) found that organizational blogs can reduce stakeholders’ perceptions of a crisis, improve relationships with stakeholders, and lead to a more positive evaluation of the organization during a crisis by providing information and customer service. Furthermore, new media—including blogs—can and should be used by organizations to reduce uncertainty during product recalls (of which the style manual crisis could be loosely considered, as a “defective” product)  and to provide the organization’s perspective on the crisis and relevant information directly to stakeholders (Taylor & Kent, 2007). Instead the APA’s “strategy” of remaining silent on the issue until it had reached a boiling point and their low-visibility response made them look reactive and incompetent and made it nearly impossible to have their message be heard by consumers. The longstanding dominance of the APA publication manual may prevent the current credibility crisis from have a long-term effect on their organizational reputation.  Should they emerge relatively unscathed, they need to immediately get to work on developing a more effective crisis communication plan, one that effectively uses new media.

Sources:

Coombs, W. T. (2007). Ongoing crisis communication (2^nd ed.). Los Angeles: Sage.

Epstein, J. (2009, October 13). Correcting a style guide. Inside Higher Ed. Retrieved October 13, 2009 from http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/10/13/apa

Skutley, M. L. (2009, October 8). Note to APA style community: Sixth edition corrections. Retrieved October 25, 2009 from http://blog.apastyle.org/apastyle/2009/10/note-to-apa-style-community-sixth-edition-corrections.html

Stephens, K. K., & Malone, P. C. (2009). If the organizations won’t give us information…: The use of multiple new media for crisis technical translation and dialogue. Journal of Public Relations Research, 21(2), 229-239.

Taylor, M., & Kent, M. L. (2007). Taxonomy of mediated crisis response. Public Relations Review, 33, 140-146.