Even though school started a few weeks ago, I feel that I have learned a great deal in my crisis management and critical thinking course at USC. I highly recommend Ian Mitroff’s book “The Unbounded Mind”. Great reading, and you really learn how to really think “outside the box” in crisis management. 🙂
One of the things that I have seen over and over again in athletics, there is one of critical crisis management steps that is missing. It seems a lot of times that some of these organizations are not thinking early enough to see what types of crises they might experience. What I mean by this is, you have to look at what your weaknesses are and what you can do to fix them. The key thing is that you have to be proactive, strategic, and to be thinking way in advance on what could happen to you or your client.
For example, if you are representing a university, there are just certain crises that you have to be prepared to address– like if one of the athletes tests positive for steroids, if a coach gets fired for inappropriate behavior, or if the crisis involves athletes getting “credit” for classes that they didn’t go to– things like that. You have a lot of people to talk to (community, fans, sponsors, donors and boosters, media, etc). One of the biggest mistakes that I see is that some people think “oh! This crisis will be over soon– I’ll wait it out”.
Universities are used to controlling what goes out in the media, especially in the campus and community newspapers. Yet today, a lot of people get their information on the Internet, which anyone can post anything that goes on at an organization, company, and even at a university. But the problem is, with the Internet, blogs, web sites, message boards– people can talk about a particular crisis and it may never go away. What goes on the Internet can also stay on the Internet for a very long time.
It is very important to have not only a public relations / communications plan, but it is vital to have a crisis management plan. For every crisis that can happen, there needs to be a step-by-step plan to execute statements, messages, and strategies to your publics. It also needs to take account on where people are getting their information at– today, there are a lot more places to cover.
It’s better to be over-preparred than not prepared at all. 🙂 My point is, it’s better to try to think of all the potential crises that you or your client faces so you are prepared to deal with them. No one can possibly think of everything that can happen to them, but what you can do is be proactive and make sure that if something unexpected comes up that you can still act professionally, patient, and present your client the best you can. I think that every person that is involved in athletics (athletes, coaches, support staff, etc) should really take the time to learn about crisis management. That’s just my opinion! 🙂
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