A real-life crisis can completely overwhelm your organisation if it is not dealt with properly.
For public relations and communications professionals looking to up their game, ensuring that your senior leadership or communications team can face the media under pressure is vital.
This guide provides a step-by-step route to communications excellence by focusing on robust preparation, testing your skills beforehand and mastering the art of handling difficult questions without losing your brand integrity.
The Mick Ord Media 10-point checklist for Crisis Communications preparation
- Create a robust plan. Ensure your organisation has a comprehensive crisis management plan firmly in place so that unexpected situations do not overwhelm you.
- Keep the plan updated. Review your crisis plan on a regular basis to ensure it remains relevant to changing circumstances.
- Test the plan frequently. Run regular practical tests on your crisis plan to guarantee that your public relations officer or senior leadership team can execute it smoothly under pressure.
- Prioritise advance preparation. Focus heavily on thorough preparation before any interview takes place so that a journalist cannot throw you off track.
- Run simulated mock interviews. Use our training sessions to run realistic, simulated interview scenarios that increase in difficulty to build agility.
- Build collaborative messaging. Gather your team members together to work collectively on establishing your core messaging priorities before facing the media.
- Anticipate the worst questions. Ask yourself directly, “What are my nightmare questions?” to identify the exact areas you are praying the journalist will not touch upon.
- Formulate responses to curved balls. Work out your exact answers to those nightmare questions in advance so you are fully equipped if a camera and an inquisitive journalist confront you.
- Commit to brand authenticity. Design your answers so they remain completely authentic and true to your brand values, ensuring you never appear slippery or dishonest to the audience.
- Capitalise on training pressure. Use structured training workshops to make errors safely, get your team thinking on their feet, and convert nervous adrenaline into high self-confidence.
Summary
Managing a corporate crisis requires proactive preparation rather than closing your eyes to the nightmare or “putting it off”.
By regularly testing your communications or senior leadership team through challenging, progressive scenarios and directly preparing for your worst-case questions, you ensure that your organisation can stand up to intense media scrutiny.
Failing to fully prepare leaves you vulnerable to being thrown off track, whereas thorough preparation allows spokespeople to think on their feet, remain true to brand values and deliver authentic responses under pressure.
Original material: Crisis communications: your nightmare questions
Source: Mick Ord, former BBC manager and founder of the Mick Ord Media Relations Consultancy, drawing on 11 years of dedicated media training experience.
If you want to know a little more about our intensive media training and crisis communications workshops, check out our media training workshops.
