PR Matters
By Abigail L. Ho-Torres
IF you’re a fan of police and law procedurals, you’ll know that secrets rarely stay hidden. The truth often comes out, and always at the most inopportune time. It’s not that different from the stink of a dead rat, buried within old walls or ceilings: the source of the smell may be invisible, but there’s no hiding the stench.
During a crisis, hiding crucial information from your publics will cause more harm than good. This is not to say that a company, brand, or even the government should release anything and everything about it, or the issues surrounding it, into the wild. It all boils down to knowing the extent of information release and the proper timing to do so.
A few weeks ago, my colleague Ron Jabal, in a column aptly titled “In Desperate Need of Crisis Leaders,” posed some very important questions: “Do we have accurate and updated information about the [Covid-19] crisis? Are policy responses and measures taken developed and conducted in a transparent manner? Do we feel secure, safe, and content with how our leaders are communicating with us during this time?”
I will not answer those questions, as I am not here to pass judgment on how the government has so far responded to this global pandemic. Those are very valid questions, though, as we are all living in very unusual, uncertain, and scary times. What you don’t know is scary, especially when it can spell the difference between life and death.
Which is why I’d like to bring to the fore the importance of transparency in crisis management and communication—something that many of us sometimes forget in the thick of our firefighting.
Take the hit now, reap the benefits later
Just recently, news anchor Arnold Clavio, in a now-deleted Instagram post, showed supposed evidence of the government directing a hospital in Metro Manila to conceal information about the number of Covid-19-related deaths in the facility. East Avenue Medical Center denied that there was such a directive, and the Department of Health launched an investigation into the allegation.
But the post had already gone viral, sparking outrage in the digital sphere. Why such a reaction from the public? One: the public does not want the government lying to them. Two: there’s no room for such secrets when the world is battling an invisible enemy that has already taken thousands of lives. Public outrage is justified when citizens feel that they are not being given the information that they need to make informed decisions about their and their loved ones’ lives.
In the article “Don’t Hide Bad News in Times of Crisis” on Harvard Business Review, Harvard professor and author Amy Edmondson advised leaders, companies, and governments to be transparent anyway, regardless of the reputational hit, as their transparency would reap them bigger benefits in the future.
“Hiding bad news is virtually a reflex in most organizations, but thoughtful leaders recognize that speaking up early and truthfully is a vital strategy in a fast-moving crisis. Reputation must be seen as a long-term game. Taking the reputational hit today from the release of bad news is likely to earn—for leaders, organizations, and nations alike—dividends in the form of future reputational gain, bringing the benefits that come when internal and external constituents trust what you say and have confidence in your commitment to solving the problems that lie ahead,” she explained.
“When the bad news starts pouring in—whether reporting crimes in a city, medical errors in a hospital, or new patient cases in a pandemic—this actually means you’ve jumped over your first hurdle to success. With accurate information, people can turn their attention and skills to the challenges of developing novel solutions to the newly visible problems. Rather than living with false confidence that all is well, leaders and subject matter experts alike can instead get to work on what needs to be done,” she added.
Delicate balancing act
According to Peter LaMotte, senior vice president of integrated marketing communications firm Chernoff Newman, transparency no longer means just providing relevant stakeholders sanitized morsels of information during a crisis. For transparency to be deemed genuine, people should be given access to information that they want or need, “not what feels ‘right’ to the business itself.”
“Gone are the days when CEOs or other high-level executives might smooth over the facts of a crisis or offer carefully selected bits of information, rather than the whole story, and expect the problem to just go away. In an era of all-encompassing, 24/7 news coverage—combined with the seemingly infinite reach of social media—a business seen to be actively dodging its own pledge of transparency can create a crisis of confidence as bad as the original triggering event itself,” he wrote in the article “The Importance of Transparency During a Crisis,” published on The CEO Magazine web site.
Being transparent is a delicate balancing act, considering that not all information can, realistically, be released for public consumption. LaMotte laid down some tips on how businesses, and even governments, can preserve proprietary information while still providing different stakeholders with the information that they require.
- Commit to rapid response. Respond quickly and honestly, enhancing public perception that you are addressing the situation.
- Share information across all platforms. The tonality and content of responses should be informative, without a hint of defensiveness. Establish and stick to a posting schedule on social-media channels, so people will see that you’re working on addressing the issue.
- Acknowledge your mistakes. Admit your mistake and own up to it, as this buys you more goodwill with stakeholders than placing the blame on someone or something else. Attempted cover-ups are usually as bad as or worse than the original issue.
- Guide employees in being transparent (but not reckless). Prep your employees on your rapid response and transparency efforts so they are up to speed on what they can or cannot post on social media or tell their personal networks.
- Prepare for transparency. Have a crisis management plan ready. It should contain clear-cut guidelines on how and when to respond when a crisis occurs, and just how much information can and should be disclosed. Focus on understanding the issue and how to address it, and share all relevant information.
- Instead of hiding the truth, choose transparency, especially in a crisis situation. There may be some blowback at the onset, but the benefits of maintaining your integrity will overshadow that eventually. It takes wisdom and courage to choose transparency. Be that wise, courageous person or organization. You owe it to your stakeholders.
PR Matters is a roundtable column by members of the local chapter of the United Kingdom-based International Public Relations Association (Ipra), the world’s premier organization for PR professionals around the world. Abigail L. Ho-Torres is AVP and Head of Advocacy and Marketing of Maynilad Water Services Inc. She spent more than a decade as a business journalist before making the leap to the corporate world.
We are devoting a special column each month to answer our readers’ questions about public relations. Please send your questions or comments to askipraphil@gmail.com.
Image credits: arne9001| Dreamstime.com
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