Lecture 2/3: Crisis communication Flashcards
What is a crisis?
A crisis is a turning point in a situation, where an important change takes place, that could determine a negative outcome
For organizations, crises include:
- Natural crises (floods, earthquakes, fires)
- Political crises (corruption, changes in government)
- Internal crises (misconduct, abuse)
What is the defintion of a crisis formulated by Coombs?
A crisis is the perception of an unpredictable event that threatens important expectancies of stakeholders related to health, safety, environmental, and economic issues, and can seriously impact an organization’s performance and generate negative outcomes
How can stakeholders in a crisis be defined?
individuals, groups, communities, or organizations who may affect, be affected by or perceive themselves to be affected by the crisis – Ndlela, 2019
Why are stakeholders important?
Interest around stakeholders comes from stakeholder theory, an economic theory that posits that organizations are embedded in a series of relationships with other organizations, communities, and institutions such as governments.
According to this theory, the goals of an organization should be the mediation of everyone’s interests (and not just making a profit)
“an organization’s success is dependent on how well it manages the relationships with key groups such as customers, employees, suppliers, communities, financiers, and other that can affect the realization of its purpose” –
R. Edward Freeman & Phillips, 2002
When thinking of how to respond to a crisis, organizations should understand the following things about their stakeholders…
- Which stakeholders are affected
- How seriously they are affected
- What are the consequences of the stakeholders being affected
This requires a classification
4 steps in stakeholder management
- identify stakeholders
- analyse stakeholders
- plan stakeholder communication
- engage stakeholders
Describe step 1 of stakeholder management
o Identify stakeholder groups/individuals
o Create stakeholder categories
o Create stakeholder contact list
Describe step 2 of stakeholder management
o Prioritize by influence/power
o Prioritize by the degree of involvement
o Create stakeholder maps
o Create stakeholder engagement grid
Describe step 3 of stakeholder management
o Create communication planning sheet
o Identify communication channels
o Identify engagement activities
o Create stakeholder communication plans
Describe step 4 of stakeholder management
o Execute communication plan
o Update communication plan
o Establish feedback mechanism
Primary vs secondary stakeholders
Primary = those who are directly, significantly or potentially affected by the activities of the organization (employees, customers, suppliers, etc). this can also mean those who are directly, significantly, and potentially affected by a crisis.
Secondary = those indirectly affected or for whom the impact is not that direct, such as the media, special interest groups and authorities.
Internal vs external stakeholders
Internal = directly affected and take part in the organization’s decision-making and operations. E.g. managers, owners, employees
External = not involved in the organization’s operations. E.g. customers, suppliers, authorities
What are the 4 different kinds of organizational linkages?
Normative stakeholders
Diffusive stakeholders
Functional stakeholders
Enabling stakeholders
Explain normative stakeholders
= Those the organization has a common interest with, shares similar problems or values. E.g. universities and middle schools
Explain diffusive stakeholders
= Stakeholders who are not involved in a company and only appear in the context of a crisis. E.g. the media, activists
Explain functional stakeholders
= Stakeholders who are essential for the management of the crisis. E.g. public security, police, ambulance
Explain enabling stakeholders
= Stakeholders who have the authority to define the parameters of a company’s crisis management. E.g. regulators, government
The matrix model; what are the 4 management strategies? (top left, top right, bottom left, bottom right)
Keep satisfied
Manage closely (maximum effort needed)
Monitor (minimum effort needed)
Keep informed
Matrix model: explain Keep satisfied
high power / low interest
Stakeholder in this category can have a lot of influence if they decide to use their power, but not a lot of interest in doing so
Matrix model: explain Manage closely
high power / high interest
This group includes key stakeholders who should be involved in decision-making
Matrix model: explain Monitor
low power / low interest
Stakeholder who barely can influence the management of the crisis
Matrix model: explain Keep informed
low power / high interest
Stakeholders who are directly affected by the crisis, but might not have the power to be heard
Sudden vs Smouldering
Sudden = an unpredictable crisis that takes place all of a sudden, without any possibility of control from the organization. Unplanned, unexpected, undersigned events
Smouldering = slow-moving and not always clear to see. Often they are based on issues that evolve over a long period of time
Latent issue -> Active issue -> Crisis
Issues are latent (i.e. inherent in the actions of an organization) until something happens that makes them active
Example: news report that shoe factories have large responsibility in climate change -> issue of sustainability for Nike becomes active
- Once they are active, overtime, they can develop into a proper full-blown crisis
Situational crisis communication theory (SCCT): What are the clusters?
Victim
Accidental
Preventable
Situational crisis communication theory (SCCT): What is the victim cluster?
organization has no responsibility, is also a victim of events (e.g. earthquake, terrorist attack, natural disasters, rumours, workplace violence, product tampering/malevolence)
Situational crisis communication theory (SCCT): What is the accidental cluster?
organization has some responsibility, but the damages were not intentional (e.g. human error, technical damage, challenges, megadamage)
Situational crisis communication theory (SCCT): What is the preventable cluster?
organization is responsible and could have prevented the crisis (e.g. corruption, management misbehaviour, human-error accidents, organizational misdeed with (no) injuries)
Crisis management: what are the 4 steps?
Crisis prevention
crisis preparedness
crisis response
post-crisis management
Crisis management: Explain step 1
Crisis prevention = signal detection
- Issues management
- Risk management
- Reputation management
- Relationships management
Crisis management: Explain step 2
Crisis preparedness
- Planning
- Communications plans
- Handbooks, logs, ICT systems
- Training, simulation, exercises
Crisis management: Explain step 3
Crisis response
- Crisis recognition
- Activation of plans
- Crisis response
Crisis management: Explain step 4
Post-crisis management
- Recovery
- Evaluation
- Learning
Lee & Atkinson, 2019: What was the research about?
Independent variables:
- Crisis involvement (high vs low)
- Message appeal (emotional vs informational)
-Brand image (functional vs symbolic)
Dependent variables:
- Purchase intention
- Negative eWOM
- Attitude towards brand
-Attitude towards message
Lee & Atkinson, 2019: What is consumer involvement?
The degree to which stakeholders are involvement in an organization influences the way they process information about a crisis (and therefore how positively/negatively they are likely to judge the organization)
Lee & Atkinson, 2019: What are message appeals?
Message appeals types include:
- The content style within the message and
- The presentation format of a message
Emotional apologies communicate and express emotions about a crisis through emotionally loaded adjectives
Informational apologies offer accurate, practical and objective information about a crisis
Lee & Atkinson, 2019: Can brand image help with crisis?
Certain characteristics of a brand image can be processes differently by consumers
- A functional brand will trigger a more cognitive reaction, aimed at utilitarian goals and problem solving.
- A symbolic brand will instead trigger an affective reaction in consumers, closer to the way they approach art.
Lee & Atkinson, 2019: What were the results of the variable ‘Crisis involvement’?
High crisis involvement -> more positive attitude towards the brand
High crisis involvement -> more purchase intention
NO effect of high crisis involvement on:
- attitude towards the message
- negative eWOM
Lee & Atkinson, 2019: What were the results of the variable ‘Symbolic brand image’?
Symbolic brand image -> more positive brand attitude
Symbolic brand image -> more purchasing intention
Symbolic brand image -> less negative WOM
NO effect of symbolic brand image on:
- attitude towards the message
Lee & Atkinson, 2019: What were the results of the interaction ‘brand image’ and ‘message appeal’ in a low crisis involvement?
a significant interaction between brand image and message appeal for
- attitude towards the brand
- attitude towards the apology
- intention to engage in negative eWOM
Attitude towards crisis in low crisis involvement
- Functional brand image = informational message appeal better
- Symbolic brand image = emotional message appeal better
Attitude towards message in low crisis involvement
- Functional brand image = informational message appeal better
- Symbolic brand image = informational and emotional more or less the same (info slightly better)
Intention to negative WOM
- Functional brand image = informational message appeal better
- Symbolic brand image = emotional message appeal better
Image restoration theory - Benoit; What are the different strategies to restorate the image?
Denial
Evasion of responsibility
Offensiveness reduction
Corrective action
Mortification
Image restoration theory - Benoit; Explain Denial
simple denial (it didn’t happen). Shifting blame (one of our employees did it)
Image restoration theory - Benoit; Explain Evasion of responsibility
minimize responsibility of the organization (e.g. employee reacted to a provocation or meant well)
Image restoration theory - Benoit; Explain Offensiveness reduction
minimize how badly the event is perceived, e.g. minimizing attacking the accuser
Image restoration theory - Benoit; Explain Corrective reduction
organization promises to solve the problem and prevent reoccurrence
Image restoration theory - Benoit; Explain Mortification
admit responsibility and apologize to the audience
Situational crisis communication theory (SCCT): Which strategies to restorate the image (Image restoration theory) fits with the clusters of SCCT?
Victim cluster = denial response
Accidental cluster = evasion of responsibility (minimization, good intentions)
Preventable cluster = Mortification or compensation
Handlin racism-fuled crisis: why is it dangerous?
It is dangerous because it is emotion fueled, attract a lot of media, can be really detrimental for reputation of individuals and companies
Handling racism-fueled crisis: Why is it potentially beneficial?
It is potentially benefical because it can trigger important conversations around race and positive change
- Denial is never a good strategy
- Shifting the blame corrective action and mortification equally effective (Baker, 2001)
- Mortification and corrective action better than shifting the blame (Kim & Yang, 2009)
Triantafillidou, A., & Yannas, P. (2020): In terms of crisis communication, are all social media the same?
Instagram is more successful than any other platform for creating branded content + customer engagement
But! On platforms like Twitter or Facebook negative comments prevail, which can be a problem in case of a crisis
Triantafillidou, A., & Yannas, P. (2020): What was the method and stimuli in this research?
3 (social media) x 5 (crisis repsonse) experiment)
Independent variables:
- social media channels
- crisis repsonse strategy
dependent variables
- organizational reputation
- behavioral intention
- social media engagement
Triantafillidou, A., & Yannas, P. (2020): What were the results?
REJECTED
There is NO direct relationship between crisis response strategy and reputation, nor between strategy and offline behavioral intentions. This means that, choosing a mortification or a more evasive strategy:
- Did not improve or worsen the hotel’s reputation
- Did not lead more or less respondents to want to visit the hotel
There is also NO interaction between strategy and medium. The fact that communications happened on Twitter or Instagram did not make any difference for the (null) effect of strategy on reputation, behavioral intention or engagement
WEAK EFFECTS
-Corrective action (crisis response strategy) generated more engagement than any other crisis response strategy.
-Results find that messages posted in Twitter, contrarily to Facebook and Instagram, leads to:
-better reputation
-more social media engagement
-higher behavioral intention
ACCEPTED
- Individuals who perceived companies as having a better reputation were also more likely to be engaged on social media, and to want to visit the hotel (behavioral intention).
- Individuals with higher social media engagement were also more likely to want to visit the hotel (behavioral intention)
