Laura Gordon: 'Whatever you do, don’t vanish'

But it's not always the right move. It may feel counterintuitive but there are a million reasons to stay visible in a crisis and step up – including maintaining the confidence of staff and customers alike.

Right now we’re in the midst of a crisis unlike any other, so there’s no blueprint for how to handle your communications. But there are certainly a range of best practice rules we’ve learned from other crises.

Having been inundated with questions from Vistage members about this very topic, I recently hosted a webinar entitled ‘Communicating Effectively in a Crisis’.

I reached out to business leaders across my network and it attracted interest from an array of sectors – catering, hospitality, professional services, healthcare and more.

I brought in PR guru Laurna Woods, CEO of Beattie Communications, to share her words of wisdom alongside director Chris Gilmour who heads up the company’s crisis division.

They talked about the way the business community has been reacting so far.

What started out as panic turned into constant firefighting but turned to gradual reassurance as measures such as the Government’s job retention scheme and the Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) were rolled out.

There followed a period of adaptation as we changed our ways of working. And while we’re still adapting, the good news is businesses are starting to settle down, take stock and consider what recovery mode looks like.

This evolving situation can make it tricky to get the right messages out to your stakeholders, but whatever you do, don’t vanish.

Laurna reflected on the last financial crash and said research had revealed businesses which kept their heads above the parapet and kept PR and marketing switched on, as well as training and development for their valued staff, reaped the benefits, recovering almost ten times faster than their competitors.

The important part is communicating in a meaningful, relevant and tasteful way. Understand your purpose and your role and make sure you’re in the headlines for the right reasons. Ditch that commercial brand messaging and focus your attention on showing you put people before profits.

Brands like Tesco have nailed it with areas like staff bonuses and community outreach, so people know they are there for their customers and their people. Specsavers too, which is focusing on emergency care for their customers and wider community engagement.

Demonstrating why it’s so important to get it right, Chris mentioned citizen journalism and said there are already “naughty lists” naming and shaming companies whose practices haven’t met consumer expectations during this crisis. And he noted that mud sticks – so companies that have irked the public may find their names circulating around social media for some time.

Perhaps most poignant of all during the webinar was the discussion we had about internal communications.

It was clear that every single business that attended the session cared deeply about their workforce and wanted to handle communications sensitively.

Some business leaders admitted they were worried being too positive could create false hope. Others worried being too negative could create panic.

Laurna summed it up well when she advised: “Many businesses still don’t know what the future will look like so it’s a difficult message to manage. Keep the tap running on positivity to maintain motivation, but balance this with an open and honest dialogue about the latest developments.

“If you choose your words carefully it’s possible to do this without scaremongering and your staff will value your honesty.”

So there you have it – tell the truth and tell it well.

Laura Gordon is a CEO coach and group chair with Vistage International, a global leadership development network for CEOs.

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