Crisis Communication in Organizations

Abstract

Crisis communication is a multidisciplinary area of study that has generated a variety of best practices and processes by which organizations communicate before, during, and after crises. Crisis communication scholarship has generated definitions of crisis and risk, crisis stages, and useful typologies and taxonomies. Various communication processes are related to crisis preparation and response – including decision making processes, risk awareness and management processes, crisis and emergency response processes, and outcomes and processes of renewal. Theories and best practices seek to foster crisis communication strategies that maintain and develop healthy stakeholder relationships, understand image and reputational assets, establish effective crisis leadership, and address other key functions for practitioners.

Commentary—Space is Hard: Using Social Media for Selective Investigative Disclosure as a Multi-faceted Crisis Communication Strategy to Achieve Technical Transparency

“…A crisis is an unexpected event or incident that may damage or destroy an organization’s operations and/or reputation (Coombs & Holladay, 2006). Crisis communication refers to how organizations interact with stakeholders before, during, and after crises (Spradley, 2017). For the organization, crisis communication includes collecting, processing, and transmitting information for the purposes of maintaining or protecting its reputation (Coombs, 2007; Coombs & Holladay, 2006; Eriksson, 2015; Spradley, 2017).…”

“…Crisis communication refers to how organizations interact with stakeholders before, during, and after crises (Spradley, 2017). For the organization, crisis communication includes collecting, processing, and transmitting information for the purposes of maintaining or protecting its reputation (Coombs, 2007;Coombs & Holladay, 2006;Eriksson, 2015;Spradley, 2017). Informed by attribution theory (Weiner, 2006), SCCT is a predictive model that prescribes effective crisis communication strategies based on the notion that stakeholders will attribute blame for a crisis as a consequence of perceived responsibility (Coombs, 2007;Spradley, 2017).…”

“…For the organization, crisis communication includes collecting, processing, and transmitting information for the purposes of maintaining or protecting its reputation (Coombs, 2007;Coombs & Holladay, 2006;Eriksson, 2015;Spradley, 2017). Informed by attribution theory (Weiner, 2006), SCCT is a predictive model that prescribes effective crisis communication strategies based on the notion that stakeholders will attribute blame for a crisis as a consequence of perceived responsibility (Coombs, 2007;Spradley, 2017). SCCT response strategies can be divided into three groups: instructing information, adjusting information, or reputation management (Coombs, 2015) (see Table 1).…”

The Effect of Crisis Management Practices in the Media Industry on the Work Performance of Employees, the Mediating Role of Trust in Co-Workers

“…A crises is a high results of event or series of events of little to no predictability that either really or perceptually threaten the performance or public perception of an organization (Spradley, 2017). Crisis management is the process in which a manager strives to meet the business objectives at an acceptable cost during crisis situations (Dinçer, 2007).…”