‘Them and us’: The most dangerous crisis narrative and how to avoid it

Written by Sandra Collins from Hayes Collins Media Ltd

Every time something goes wrong, a narrative quickly emerges:

• Poor suffering customer

vs

• Cold hearted, uncaring, faceless corporation

We call it the ‘them and us’ narrative and guess what? You probably walked right into it.

Bad things will happen to even the best organisation. From cyber-attacks to plane crashes, to product recalls you’ll quickly end up in opposition to your customers if you make these five common errors:

Leaving a gap

Something has gone wrong. You don’t have all the facts or all the answers. So you wait. And you wait. And you wait until all your ducks are in a row.

By this point you’ve lost a grip on the story. Because your customers won’t be waiting patiently for the facts to emerge. You’ve left a gap and someone is going to fill it. Guess what? It’s not someone who is going to say you’re doing a bang-up job.

They’ll be on social media complaining and worrying and above all, speculating about what has really happened (and what you’re hiding).

You need to be ready with an effective holding line and regular updates from the earliest possible stage.

Tone deaf communication

We get it. You’re worried about saying the wrong thing. And so you should be. This is not the time to make the situation worse.

But this justifiable concern often leads to the wrong decision: to make everything you say so bland and safe that you end up saying nothing at all. And that is just as risky.

Your customers will be emotional. If your tone contrasts too much, you’ll sound cold, corporate and uncaring.

Respectful, clear and cliché free language help people who are upset and agitated to hear what you’re saying, believe it and trust you. Above all, sound like a human.

Making it all about you

Yes, it’s tough managing a crisis. But guess what?

Nobody cares.

Because it’s your job. It might even be your fault. And above all, it’s probably even tougher for the people affected.

That’s why BP’s Tony Haywood saying ‘I’d like to get my life back’ was received with such fury after a catastrophic oil spill destroyed livelihoods. And why he’s no longer BP’s Tony Hayward.

Of course you want to look after your staff and show your support. But make it clear that your primary focus is on those affected.

Empathy + Action

Crises don’t bring out the best in everyone. People might shout at your staff. People might have unrealistic expectations of how quickly you can solve the problem.

When we’re confronted with such behaviour our instinct is to be defensive, whether in person or in a media interview. But if instead you can approach with empathy, things start to look a little different.

Let’s say you’re a station manager whose services have been cancelled due to a rail-side landslip. Local media come to interview you. Here are two ways you might approach the same question:

“Your customers say they’ve been stuck on a train platform for two hours with no sign of when you’re going to them home. They say you’ve let them down – how do you answer that?

Defensive answer: “Well we didn’t cause the landslip so people need to calm down and be patient, especially when we’re doing our best to sort it out.”

Empathetic answer: “Of course they feel like that – we know people rely on us to get them to where they need to be and it’s incredibly frustrating when things go wrong.”

Going towards those affected takes the oppositional heat out of the situation.

But empathy alone is not enough. What are you actually doing to put things right?

“The emergency responders have told us that realistically it won’t be until tomorrow until the landslip is cleared. That’s why we’re put our back-up plan into action and a fleet of coaches will be arriving within the next twenty minutes to get people where they need to be as soon as possible.”

Where are the visuals?

Let’s go back to risk.

Written statements are fine for newspapers and online news but don’t have much impact on social media – especially if dramatic eye-witness footage of an incident or video selfies from affected people is out there.

Having a senior leader delivering your statement is where it’s at – but only if they know what they’re doing. Train, practise and prepare. Do your team know how to film, edit and caption a simple smartphone video? Have you thought about a suitable background? Are they dressed appropriately? And do you have senior leaders trained to deliver messages effectively – everyone can be coached to do this but few people are naturals.

The one thing all of these points have in common is trust. If we stop trusting those whose job it is to solve the crisis, then it’s game over. It’s not enough to be doing the right thing – you need to be seen to be doing it.

No-one wants to spend time and money preparing for something that might never happen.

But then we never enjoy paying for home insurance either. Until our house burns down.

For help with preparing for a crisis, contact Hayes Collins Media on info@hayescollins.co.uk or call Sandra Collins on 07939 128942.