CRISIS COMMUNICATIONS OtherWise · 2014-02-22 · Crisis Communications In a Diverse and Divisive World!! The management of any crisis requires a deep and broad understanding of others.Today,

Crisis Communications In a Diverse and Divisive World

The management of any crisis requires a deep and broad understanding of others. Today, that includes many people who are very different from ourselves. Those differences can be the cause of divisiveness. Diversity and divisiveness may be the most salient characteristics of our time. We need to be smarter about building bridges across those differences. Wiser about the Other. Unfortunately, much of the time, we’re operating on auto-pilot and no one’s in the cockpit.

Example: If this guy sat next to you on subway, every nerve ending in your body would react. Disgust. Maybe fear. Psychologist Susan Fiske of Princeton discovered when people see pictures like this, the part of the brain that normally activates to pictures of people (fusiform face area) fails to come online. What does light up is the area associated with disgust, garbage, human waste (anterior insular). But when you ask people to imagine what the homeless guy might eat, their feelings change. They begin to see him as an individual, rather than as an exemplar of the "homeless." Why are we like that?

Blame our common grandmother, 2400 generations removed. Those who had a natural revulsion to spoiled meat and excrement were more likely to survive and have children because they didn’t get sick. Those children inherited the same gut instincts, all the way down to us.  

Two mental processes: fast and slow. “Fast thinking” is processed in the brain’s amygdala. Characterized by snap assessments of situations, subconscious thinking. Intuition is an example of fast thinking. It’s deeply affected by cognitive illusions like confirmation bias, anchoring effect, availability bias, bandwagon effect, priming, etc. “Slow thinking” is associated with the brain’s prefrontal cortex. It is characterized by deep analysis and is thus taxing.

Ideally, both processes work together. Problem: While we’re still processing information in our prefrontal cortex, our amygdala is gathering associations, feelings, old memories and drawing conclusions. It processes information two times faster than pre-frontal cortex (12 vs. 24 milliseconds). All those associations and connotations look like an answer when we don’t yet have enough information or enough time to think things through.

Implicit biases. Threatening environment. Cognitive illusions. That’s one reason it’s important to think through how you’re going to respond to a crisis before it happens and you’re assaulted by those non-conscious biases and feelings.

OtherWiseOtherWise

CRISIS COMMUNICATIONS IN A DIVERSE AND DIVISIVE WORLD

Our judgments are heavily biased!by inherited illusions, which helped!us survive in!snake-infested!jungles but have!nothing to do!with logic.!”“

- Daniel Kahnehan

Input

Thalamus

Amygdala Neo-CortexStrong Link

Weak Link

12 milliseconds 24 milliseconds

Automatic Response Considered Response

www.YourMorals.org

You never have enough data, but even when you do, it all goes through the filter of your past experience, your current concerns, and your innate prejudices, biases, and cognitive illusions. This is especially when you’re embroiled in a crisis. What is a crisis?  

In my experience, a true crisis has high emotional content, polarizes internal and external constituencies and so threatens the company’s very survival that it crowds everything else off the company’s agenda – not only in its public relations, but also in its operations. Every crisis is unique but they all warrant a common approach. Not every crisis threatens a company’s very existence, but they do threaten something on which its existence depends — it’s reputation.    

Reputation is a meta-concept. It’s what people think other people think. No company owns its reputation or brand. Other people own it and control it. Hardest thing to wrap your head around. Who are these people?  

People who contribute to your success and bear the risk of your failures. Customers, employees, investors, partners, suppliers. Also the communities in which you operate. Some of your obligations to these stakeholders are matters of contract or law. Others are moral/ethical considerations that haven’t been codified but are no less legitimate. What are their expectations?  

Need to look at these through the eyes of stakeholders. What matters is not your definition of safe products, but theirs. Ironically, business success is directly proportional to depth of customer relationships but the deeper your relationship, the more the impact of a crisis should it develop, as we will see. Understanding stakeholders is more difficult than ever.  

Stakeholders have changes more in last 5 years than in past 50. Media fragmentation, consumer control, third party scrutiny, private label brands, globalization. And unprecedented social change.  

U.S. thinks of itself as a nation of immigrants, but we’ve always been ambivalent about them. Ben Franklin worried about Germanization of America. Today, people are worried about its Hispanization. Ironically, the proportion of foreign born in the US is about where it’s been historically, except for a brief period in the middle of the last century.  

A leader always !acts subconsciously !in a crisis and then !thinks of the reasons !for his action.

“”Jawaharial Nehru

A true PR crisis!is existential, !

highly emotional, and!crowds everything else !

off the company’s !agenda.!

When Is A PR Problem!A Crisis?

It takes 20 years!to build a reputation!and five minutes!to ruin it.“”Warren Buffett

StakeholdersPeople who contribute to a company’s success and bear the risk of its

failure.

Expectations!1. Sell safe products!!

2. Treat employees fairly!!

3. Operate responsibly!

All the old formulas need to be rethought.!New technologies have unleashed changes in people’s behavior. They have different habits,

whether they’re shopping, working, !or just hanging out at home.!

!

“”Shelly Lazarus

Ogilvy&Mather

Globalization’s!Third Wave

232 million migrants!worldwide!in 2013!!

- 72 million! in the EU!!

- 46 million! in the US

Source: International Organization for Migration, World Migration Report, 2013

Proportion of foreign born is lower than at its peak in early 20th century when my own ancestors came to America. But higher than it was at the nadir in 1970. But biggest change is where these people come from.

2010 -- 14% from Canada and Europe, 86% from Other (29% from Asia, 53% from Latin America). What they have in common: color.

Four states minority-majority (California, Texas, Hawaii, New Mexico), 22 largest metro areas. One out of seven marriages inter-racial. 65+ fastest growing segment (3 - 4M/yr). Record multi-generational HH (one in six Americans). Most HH headed by women. 42% of births to unmarried women. Most people favor same-sex marriage. Married with children now a niche, less than a fifth of market.  

The Other is not only the immigrant at home and the stranger abroad. He or she is also the product of the strange, and somewhat paradoxical, times in which we live. Digital technologies that promised to bring us together by making the world smaller have made us smaller by allowing us to create our own private worlds.

It’s easier to outrage people these days. Everyone seems to covered with hot buttons. You can ignite them without even knowing it. And if we’re honest with ourselves, we’ll recognize that we’re walking around with a roster of implicit biases.  

It’s also reflected in grass root political feelings. Since 1977, National Election Survey has asked people to gauge the warmth of their feelings for their own party and the other party on a theoretical thermometer from 0 to 100 degrees.

Political element. But society’s faith in institutions, corporations, and leaders has been severely rocked by scandals and betrayals, from misconduct at our investment banks to salmonella in our peanut butter to human growth hormone in our baseball players. Less than one fifth (13%) of global consumers believe government and business leaders "will tell the truth when confronted with a difficult issue."

15%5% 13%

1910 1970 2010

U.S. Foreign-Born

Source: US Census Bureau

!

!

Multi-racial!Multi-cultural!Multi-generational!Traditional!Non-traditional!

Strange Times

Technologies!that promised to make !

our world smaller!have made us smaller.

”- Salman Rusdie

“You define yourselfby what offends you.You define yourselfby what outrages you.

Trust In Government

Source: Pew Research Center., “Trust in Government, 1958 - 2013.” Oct. 2013.

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010

0

20

40

60

80

We don’t even trust each other. What is trust? Where does it come from? What is it based on?

My theory (still in development): Trust has three principal components — the first two are competence and affinity. Competence is the stakeholder’s judgment of the brand’s capabilities. Affinity is the stakeholder’s feeling of warmth towards the brand. How do you achieve high competence and affinity? By providing a product or service that has high meaning.  

High meaning comes from fulfilling a need that is important to the person being served. It’s acting with higher purpose. Addressing someone’s needs, values, and aspirations in a meaningful way.

People hire products to do jobs. Job can be functional, emotional or social. Strongest are all three. Not always articulated. Problems occur when fail at job or abandon it. Sometimes companies forget their purpose and get distracted by other things ... like technology, stock price, fads, etc.    

Black and Decker was established in 1910 to manufacture power tools. In 1984, bought GE small appliances. The meanings of the Black & Decker product at home (domestic, daily, female) leaked into brand on the work site. What ought to be industrial, exceptional and male took on new cultural meaning. In1992: adopted De Walt brand to re-gender power tools and restore their industrial, exceptional, male and heroic meanings.  

Trust is based on affinity, competence, and meaning. When a brand breaks that trust, it’s a betrayal. Rebuilding trust – and recovering from the crisis – requires understanding the root cause.  

For more on step zero, see my article in the Conference Board Review, “Bad Reputation.”    (http://www.tcbreview.com/web-exclusives/157-web-exclusives/305-bad-reputation.html)  

Low High

High

Competence

Affi

nity

Drivers of Trust

Trust

Distrust Respect

Disappointment

Based on concepts developed by John Spence, Business Consultant, !and Susan Fiske, Department of Psychology, Princeton University.

Low High

High

Competence

Affi

nity

MeaningLow

Higher !Purpose

People don’t buy!quarter-inch drill bits.!They buy quarter-inch!

holes.“

”- Ted Levitt

A true PR crisis!is existential, !

highly emotional, and!crowds everything else !

off the company’s !agenda.!

When Is A PR Problem!A Crisis?

It’s a!Betrayal.

Rules of Crisis Management Step Zero: Risk Management!

• Deep Stakeholder Perspective !• Scan For Vulnerabilities!• Prepare Response Plan!

!

Step One: Declare the crisis!• Put Someone In Charge!• Link Operations & Communications!• Identify Affected Stakeholders!• Monitor Media & Stakeholders!

!

Step Two: Act!• Tell The Truth Quickly!• Take Responsibility!• Fix Root Problem At Source!• Tell People How You Fixed It !

!

Step Three: Give Something Back

Assess!Acknowledge!Apologize!Act!Amend

For more, please subscribe to my blog or follow me on Twitter @PRreader.  

 © Dick Martin, 2014    

www.DickMartinBlogs.com