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Crisis planning (or a blessing in disguise)
CAST your mind back to 2014. Ebola was in the news, as was the death of actor Robin Williams. Can you recall anything about the death of a pilot who crashed while testing out a spacecraft for tourists over the Mojave Desert?
If you can, you may remember the response given by the spacecraft’s parent company Virgin Media. Leading from the front, owner Sir Richard Branson flew immediately to the site, keeping followers updated every step of the way on social media. The Virgin Communications team immediately went to work creating messaging around how hard space travel is to conquer, but how ultimately worthwhile it is. They told us this poor man’s death wasn’t in vain and that the project would move forward in his honour. We believed them, we believed Branson, the news cycle moved forward and this year Virgin Galactic launched its astronaut readiness programme.
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Flashback to 2010 when a BP-owned oil rig exploded off the Gulf of Mexico leading to one of the largest oil spills in US history. It took almost 90 days to get the spill under control… and BP’s boss? He started a blame game. Two months later he told journalists: “There’s no one who wants this thing over more than I do, I’d like my life back”. Just months later Tony Hayward was forced to resign and BP’s reputation lay in tatters.
Crises come and go, some are of the proportion that Virgin Media and BP faced,
others can be characterised more as blips in the road. However you look at them, whatever their scale, you are faced with a choice. Burying your head in the sand will go some way but it might just be possible to reframe the story, build a different narrative and, like Virgin Media, turn a tragedy into something positive and impactful. At the very least you can make a serious dent in damage limitation.
How to go about this? How do you capture the right tone or tell the right story? The
Recognise that if you have a great reputation you already have credit in the bank. Draw on that credit and don’t be afraid to engage with your public."
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