Recommendation
1. First, building strong relationships with government officials during peacetime will help establish a shared understanding of the need to work together effectively in a crisis. Second, crisis exercises can be used to practise a multi-actor response, agree the structures and processes required to coordinate activity, and develop stakeholder engagement skills. Whilst not necessarily overriding the political imperatives that can make a crisis response dysfunctional, these actions can help mitigate their impact.
These events, however, were criticised – for their content rather than their form – by a number of stakeholders. Some critiqued the performance of the spokespeople. Others found fault in the absence of ‘new news’ being offered.
These criticisms do not undermine the argument in favour of communicating early, quickly and regularly with stakeholders. But they do pose questions about precisely how an organisation should engage with them when the operational reality is unchanging or when the information available is limited.
The use of third parties to manage expectations about the operational challenges being faced is one option. Another is to paint a picture of what is happening and what your organisation is doing so that key stakeholders can fully grasp the scale of the crisis and understand the endeavours of those on the frontline. This will not compensate for the lack of new information but can demonstrate that the organisation is trying to resolve the situation as quickly and effectively as it can
Organisations will need to consider their position and anticipate the challenges that they may encounter, seeking input from HR colleagues, as well as other key disciplines such as Communications, Finance, and Security. Any policies that are subsequently developed should be entrenched through training that also prepares colleagues to accept that