When Disaster Strikes
September is National Preparedness Month. No matter what type of business you own, sometimes disaster strikes — a natural disaster, a widespread illness like coronavirus, or something more personal, such as a death among staff members or family.
As a business owner, you have to be prepared to communicate with your employees and clientele in an appropriate and timely manner.
Below are guidelines that you can follow to ensure your messaging is both prompt and effective.
Make Your Plan
First and foremost, you need to make a plan. All forms of communication within your business require some level of organization, so crisis communication is no exception.
With this in mind, consider what crisis preparations you can make when things are going well, long before a crisis actually hits.
Think about what could go wrong in each area of your business. Could there be physical damage to the property? Could you experience a large deficit in funding? Could you be faced with temporarily (or even permanently) laying off your employees? These are just a few of the potential issues you need to consider during your preparatory planning.
If possible, organize a crisis team, including any legal representatives, PR managers, and other trusted associates to collaborate with you on a crisis game plan. Note who is in charge of each area and make sure that all supervisors know what will be expected of them and their subordinates in the event of a crisis scenario.
Don’t be afraid to delegate tasks to the people around you. Small businesses often have the advantage of a more familial setting, so your employees are likely to want to help you keep things running smoothly.
Be aware that you cannot fully prepare for every possible scenario. In most cases, you won’t know how bad a crisis is going to be until it happens.
However, this is no excuse to forgo early preparations and planning, as these will be much harder to manage in the midst of an ongoing hardship.
Do Your Research
When a crisis situation does occur, it is essential that you prepare before communicating to your employees and clients. Misinformation is one of your greatest enemies, as it will cause rumors to spread and escalate and will encourage what may already be developing into large-scale panic. Focus on the facts.
Use only the most credible sources to find out what is true about the current situation, including its origins, current status at the time of your communications, known outcomes, and any solid projections for the future.
Do not embellish. While you will want to share as much information as you can, remind yourself that it is okay to not know everything.
With any type of crisis, information circulates and evolves rapidly, but it is often difficult to find real, definitive answers to some pressing questions.
Don’t be afraid to admit what you do not know. Sharing this bit of honesty is better than spreading false information or no information at all.
Craft Your Communications
Consider your message and your audience—what are you trying to say and to whom are you saying it? This will have a sizable impact on your approach.
What tone and words should you use? What does your audience expect? According to Diana Pisciotta of Inc.com, “Among the messages that are invariably part of any good crisis response:
- “A succinct explanation of what went wrong
- An expression of concern for the impact that the situation has on customers, employees, the general public, etc.
- A sincere apology, if warranted[…]and a sense that the company takes responsibilities for any missteps it may have made
- A commitment to identifying the underlying factors that caused this situation to happen and addressing them” (Inc.com).
For the most part, your main audience should be your employees and clients. These are the people you are most directly responsible for sharing important information with, as they are the ones who will be most affected by your crisis situation.
However, be sure to consider any additional persons that could suffer from the situation; you don’t want to leave anyone out. Once you have determined the “who” and “what” (your audience and message), you can decide how to put your message forth—that is, whether it should come via email, webinar, in-person meeting, etc.—and then do it.