It’s been a busy year for crises for people and companies alike. Some of the largest, best-known brands found themselves under fire for months, many with a series of scandals that just kept coming. Some of these crises were caused directly by the caught-on-video bad behavior of key executives, such as Uber’s founder and former…
Guest blogger: Brad Cole, CFE & LPI, Executive Director & Senior Coordinator, K9 First Responders, Inc. (K9FR) A crisis unfolds. A hurricane hits your facility. You prepare and respond. So far… under control. A natural gas line ruptures, fire starts and an explosion occurs. 5 dead and 10 seriously injured. A crisis becomes a…
The media continue to be filled with stories about companies that fail to manage crisis situations, costing them millions in damage, fines and reparations, lost revenue and lost jobs. Many of those failures can be tracked to a few common causes: 1) lack of attention to the identification and assessment of risks, 2) weak leadership…
At some point, nearly every organization will experience a crisis. For many, unfortunately, their crisis planning strategy is denial: “that will never happen to our company.” Except that it probably will. Sooner than you think. When all hell breaks loose, consider these “truths” of a crisis as you wade in to manage your organization’s reputation,…
On October 25, 2011, a young American humanitarian aid worker, Jessica Buchanan, was in Somalia teaching children how to avoid landmines when she and her colleague were kidnapped for ransom by Somali bandits. They were held in the desert at gunpoint for 93 days before they were rescued by Seal Team 6. Buchanan will be…
On October 25, 2011, Jessica Buchanan and a colleague were kidnapped at gunpoint by Somali land pirates and held for 93 days, enduring the most harrowing and painful experience of her life. On the day of her kidnapping, she silently said to herself, “Some do come out alive, the numbers are small but they do…
Violent situations can happen at a moment’s notice and are typically planned events. Dallas police just experienced an active shooter situation that took five police officers lives during a peaceful demonstration. How do you prepare yourself and your organization for violent attacks? Do you have a process for evaluating your organization’s ability to respond to…
Carnival Cruise Line faced a serious threat to its people, passengers, and public image when a ship lost power due to an engine room fire in the Gulf of Mexico. Within a few hours, some of the ship’s 4,000 passengers began sharing stories through social media and cell phones. Friends and family of the…