Understanding Crisis Communication Concepts By Sani Usman Kukasheka
This article was first published in Spokespersin’sdigest.com
In recent times, the management of crises has become what nations, corporate organizations, institutions, and companies need to contend with in order to protect their images and reputations. The efforts to manage these crises often attract national and global concerns in the media.
The ability and proficiency of those saddled with information management in organisations greatly affect the overall image of that organisation. This is more so during times of crisis. Knowing the areas to address and what to avoid therefore becomes a fundamental requirement for PR managers and spokespersons. It is against this backdrop that I am making this presentation where I will highlight various peculiarities and characteristics of communication during crisis which will all be geared towards coming up with how not to communicate during crisis.
Crisis Communication is a sub-specialty of the public relations profession that is designed to protect and defend an individual, company or organisation facing a public challenge to its reputation. The renowned communication scholar Timothy Coombs defined crisis as “the perception of an unpredictable event that threatens important expectancies of stakeholders and can seriously impact an organisation’s performance and generate negative outcomes.” He further defined crisis communication as “the collection, processing, and dissemination of information required to address a crisis situation.” In simpler words, a crisis leads to uncertainty and causes major harm to the organisation and its employees.
Crisis Communication can be further viewed as an initiative that aims at protecting the reputation of an organisation and maintaining its public image. The main purpose of crisis communication is to protect the brand identity and maintain the organisation’s firm standing within the industry. In taking a cursory look at the concept of crisis communication, therefore, there is the need to discuss various theories that explain certain ways to look at and explain a crisis situation in crisis communication research which include but not restricted to the following:
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a. Image Repair Theory. The Image Repair Theory (IRT) as propounded by William Benoit established IRT based on apologia studies. IRT assumes that image is an asset that a person or an organisation attempts to protect during a crisis. When the person or the organisation is attacked, the organisation involved should make efforts or draft messages to repair its image. Benoit further introduced 5 general and 14 specific response strategies the accused could harness during a crisis. General categories include denial, evading responsibility, reducing offensiveness, corrective action and mortification.
b. Situational Crisis Communication Theory. Timothy Coombs started working on Situational Crisis Communication Theory (SCCT) in 1995. It originated from the attribution theory, SCCT assumes that crises are negative events that stakeholders’ attempt to attribute responsibility to. Coombs believes crisis managers can employ different crisis strategies according to different crisis situations. In differentiating SCCT from IRT, SCCT is an audience–oriented theory that focuses on stakeholder’s perception of crisis situations. This idea is in line with Benoit’s argument that crisis concerns more about perception than reality.
c. Social-Mediated Crisis Communication Model. As Social networks and blogs become popular, people spend more time online during crises. Social-Mediated Crisis Communication (SMCC) was introduced to investigate crisis management in an online context. The model first explains how the source and form of information affect response selections and then proposes crisis response strategies. The model argues that 5 factors influence an organisation’s communication during a crisis. These include crisis origin, crisis type, infrastructure, message strategy, and message form.
d. Integrated Crisis Mapping Model. Another line of crisis communication research focuses on stakeholder’s emotional change in times of crisis. Jin, Pang and Cameron introduced the Integrated Crisis Mapping Model (ICM) model to understand stakeholders varied emotions during a crisis. ICM assumes that people keep interpreting their emotions during a crisis.
Brig Gen Sani Kukasheka Usman (rtd), a former spokesperson of the Nigerian Army, is the Advisory Board Chair of Spokesperson’s Digest. He is a member of the National Institute (mni), a Fellow and Governing Council member of the Nigerian Institute of Public Relations (NIPR), a Fellow African Public Relations Association (fapra), and a Fellow of the Nigerian Army Resource Centre (fnarc).
