Who Are Your Stakeholders?

[By Nora Jacobs]

Short of prison time or financial ruin, businesses and other organizations probably fear media coverage of their problems more than any other threat confronting them.  Media, of course, love to leap on stories laden with conflict, guilt and incompetence, so it’s a justified fear.  Good crisis communication response strategies make sure clients are well-prepared to tell their story convincingly to skeptical and probing reporters.

But the reality is that the media are only one audience among many that clients must talk to when crisis strikes their organization.  Every group or individual who has a stake in an organization’s success (hence the term), deserves to hear your side of the story directly from you, without the filter the media sometimes impose on what they report.  Whether it’s nervous donors, irate shareholders, capricious customers, anxious employees or uneasy neighbors, all of your stakeholders are depending on you to share the facts about a situation that affects them as much as it affects you.

Sharing that information in a timely and appropriate manner involves careful planning and a delicate dance to make sure the right groups hear the right information in the right way and the right order. It means making sure you are communicating consistently and making sure you deliver your story using the appropriate communication vehicle.  Nothing is worse than trying to explain why one set of stakeholders has certain facts and another group doesn’t.  And nothing is more discouraging than realizing your email outreach didn’t resonate with millennials.

Ironically, we’ve found the best way to communicate is often the most old-fashioned:  face-to-face communications that allow for an honest, two-way exchange. Those types of conversations build trust, and building trust is the best way to rebuild a reputation that’s been tarnished by immersion in crisis. If your communications strategy during a crisis consists of lying low until the storm passes, think again.  Stakeholder trust is hard to earn and even harder to regain.  Communicating openly under the worst of circumstances is one of the most effective crisis management tools you can employ.

Photo Credit:  Wikipedia