Why practitioners do (not) apply crisis communication theory in practice

Abstract

Twenty-five in-depth interviews with Belgian crisis communication practitioners were conducted to examine the gap between theory and practice. Crisis communication has become an important research area within public relations. Several studies have resulted in theories and guidelines regarding the effective use of communication during organizational crises.Unfortunately, these findings are not always put into practice. This study examines to what extent public relations practitioners apply theory in practice during crises and why. The findings offer an opportunity to formulate potential ways in which we can bridge the scholar-practitioner divide in public relations, through guidelines for both scholars and practitioners. Why practitioners do (not) apply crisis communication theory in practiceCrisis communication research has offered a number of clear and useful theoretical guidelines to put into practice. Many of these guidelines stress the accountability of organizations in crisis (cf. Coombs, 2015). Situational Crisis Communication Theory (Coombs, 2007), for instance, indicates that an organization that is blamed for a crisis should communicate crisis response strategies that express acceptance of responsibility. Research on crisis timing strategies similarly stresses the importance of open and responsible communication and shows that organizations should steal thunder (Arpan & Roskos-Ewoldsen, 2005). That is, they should self-disclose incriminating information instead of trying to conceal it (Claeys & Cauberghe, 2012). Research illustrates, however, that while offering a full apology might be the most effective crisis response strategy when responsibility attributions are high, the most frequently employed strategies are bolstering and denial ). In addition, literature suggests that practitioners acknowledge the value of stealing thunder, but rarely selfdisclose crises (Kline, Simunich, & Weber, 2009;Ulmer, 2012). As such, a gap exists between theoretical guidelines and crisis communication practice. This study aims to explore the roots of this gap to formulate solutions to bridge the divide.We first discuss potential causes and solutions for the so-called scholar-practitioner divide, or rigor-relevance gap, based on insights from aligned fields (cf. Kieser, Nicolai, & Seidl, 2015). Then we examine this divide in the context of public relations and, more specifically, crisis communication. A brief overview is given of the most widely supported guidelines in the crisis communication literature. In addition, the few studies that examined the extent of the divide in crisis communication and literature that attempts to bridge it are discussed. Finally, we discuss an exploratory study that conducted 25 in-depth interviews with Belgian communication professionals between February and May 2015. The findings indicate which factors limit the practical application of crisis communication theory, according to senior public relations practitioners. These insights allow us to look ahead and explore how we can furth...

Activating constructive employee behavioural responses in a crisis: Examining the effects of pre‐crisis reputation and crisis communication strategies on employee voice behaviours

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Explicating the social constructionist perspective on crisis communication and crisis management research: a review of communication and business journals

“…Previous scholars have identified four major limitations of the current crisis literature. First, crises are "deliberately oversimplified" into de-contextualized types and modes (Gilpin & Murphy, 2008, p. 13) that prevent the practical application of crisis research (Claeys & Opgenhaffen, 2016;Lehmberg & Hicks, 2018). Traditional CCMR views a crisis as an objective and "real" thing that exists "out there" and affects an organization.…”

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“…The scholars who conduct a research on crisis communication and media use from 2015-2020 classified by the continent are still dominated by the European continent (e.g. [28]), America (e.g. [29]) at the second place, and Asia (e.g.…”