Author: Jonathan & Erik Bernstein

Behaving as if you could be caught on tape at any moment is just good crisis management

You are ALWAYS on camera. Cornell University’s assistant dean for students found this out the hard way after becoming the latest figure to have shocking behavior exposed via YouTube.

An undercover reporter for Project Veritas, which operates under the tagline, “Investigating and exposing corruption in both public and private institutions” posed as a student interested in attending the university and captured a series of incredible responses from the dean on a hidden camera.

While the many cuts in the video have some feeling skeptical, it’s hard to deny its legitimacy when the dean is asked, “If you supported Hamas would that be a problem?”, and, in a direct response, states the university would not be opposed.

Whether this is a case of political correctness gone too far or a major American university telling potential students (aka customers) anything they want to hear we may never know, but what’s for certain is that it’s yet another reminder that you can safely assume cameras are rolling whether you can see them or not.

A reputation as trustworthy is a must for any organization

Edelman’s Trust Barometer is an annual report that seeks to measure trust in business and government. It analyzes both hard data and sentiment in a number of categories, and the results help guide the decision-making and priorities of intelligent organizations the world over.

This year’s report showed an even further erosion of trust across the board, and highlighted the significant issues this lack of trust creates. Here are a few key findings from the report:

• Government remains the least trusted institution for the fourth consecutive year, with trust levels below 50 percent in 19 of 27 countries, including the U.S. (41 percent), U.K. (43 percent) and Japan (40 percent).
• Media as an institution is distrusted by 60 percent of countries and for the first time, online search engines are now a more trusted source for general news and information (64 percent) than traditional media (62 percent).
• Trust in NGOs declined for only the second time but remained the most trusted institution. In 19 of 27 countries, trust in NGOs fell or remained at equal levels to the previous year and saw dramatic drops in the U.K. (16 points) and China (12 points).
• There is a tangible impact of trust. Nearly two-thirds (63 percent) of respondents refuse to buy products and services from a company they do not trust, while 58 percent will criticize them to a friend or colleague. Conversely, 80 percent chose to buy products from companies they trusted, with 68 percent recommending those companies to a friend.
• A majority of respondents (81 percent) believe a company can take specific actions that both increase profits and improve the economic and social conditions in the community where it operates, while three-quarters (75 percent) feel a company can be more profitable by finding ways to solve social and community problems.

Trust is a valuable commodity, yet organizations continue to throw it aside. One of Bernstein Crisis Management’s core tenets is the belief that reputation truly is your most valuable asset, and, as the study clearly shows, a reputation of being trustworthy is a must for success today.

NBC chief medical correspondent learns a hard lesson

Practicing what you preach is vital to crisis management. Now former NBC chief medical correspondent Dr. Nancy Snyderman learned that lesson the hard way after breaking a (semi) voluntary quarantine imposed as a result of a crew member falling ill with Ebola while filming in Liberia.

Although the team agreed to the quarantine, Snyderman and members of her crew were spotted grabbing takeout food just days after it began. This resulted in major public outcry and Snyderman being placed on “family leave” from NBC. Her situation was only further compounded after she released a disingenuous statement that made it clear she took zero personal responsibility for the misstep.

“While under voluntary quarantine guidelines, which called for our team to avoid public contact for 21 days, members of our group violated those guidelines and understand that our quarantine is now mandatory until 21 days have passed. We remain healthy and our temperatures are normal. As a health professional I know that we have no symptoms and pose no risk to the public, but I am deeply sorry for the concerns this episode caused. We are thrilled that Ashoka is getting better and our thoughts continue to be with the thousands affected by Ebola whose stories we all went to cover.”

Snyderman did eventually appear on the Today show where she offered a more solid apology, but the damage was done. According to insider reports her relationship with the network continued to slide downhill, and earlier this month she stepped down from her position of nine years.

Whatever your purpose, position, or product, it’s absolutely critical that you practice what you preach. Saying one thing while doing another may work for a while, but when your stakeholders catch on things are guaranteed to get rough.

Training your brain to perform in crisis management mode

There’s no denying that it takes a great deal of skill to successfully run an organization’s day-to-day operations. However, that mindset and ability doesn’t always translate over to crisis management. Even the most competent of managers can find themselves feeling lost when an ugly situation gets out of control, as it really does take a different kind of thinking to thrive in that environment.

Management consultant Lucien G. Canton describes crisis management-style thinking as dependent on pattern recognition rather than a structured decision-making process, and shared three steps to increase one’s ability to recognize and assess patterns in an article for GovExec.com:

Direct experience. While there is truly no substitute for actual experience, crises have a way of involving the people least equipped to handle them. The crisis for many will be an once-in-a-lifetime event. However, remember that we are considering patterns, not identical situations, so experience gained in one situation could be applicable to a different one.

Learning from the experience of others. There are numerous case histories of organizations that have successfully survived crisis. There is even more literature on those that did not. Research demonstrates that reading accounts of other crises and the decisions made during them is almost as effective as gaining direct experience. Reading articles in business magazines, reviewing case studies and after action reports, and viewing documentaries all can increase the patterns available for recall. This is why so many military officers study historical campaigns.

Simulations. Simulations or exercises combine the best of both worlds. They can be based on hypothetical scenarios or actual scenarios found in after action reports or articles. In addition, they can provide direct experience to participants, allowing them to become familiar with the physiological changes brought on by stress. Even something as simple as a short discussion-based exercise can provide additional pattern sets to decision-makers.

What do these all boil down to? Experience. Putting yourself in situations, over and over again, where you see actions and their resulting outcomes is the number one way to train your brain to perform when it comes to crisis management mode. Although you’ll never experience or simulate every single possible situation, hard work will mean you’ll always have similar instances to base your thinking on.

Refusing to respect the wants of customers is a bad business plan

Is anyone else disgusted that it’s no longer shocking to see a major telecomms provider standing staunchly against the wants of their customers? Online privacy is one of the fastest-rising influences of consumer decisions today, yet AT&T has gone full scumbag when it comes to its new broadband service. Unless you pay an additional $29/mo on top of your standard monthly your every move will be tracked, cataloged, and likely sold off to bolster profits even further.

The Guardian’s Sophia Cope and Jeremy Gillula shared more info on this ridiculous scheme:

AT&T reportedly plans to track and monetize its broadband customers’ internet activity – “webpages you visit, the time you spend on each, the links or ads you see and follow, and the search terms you enter” – to deliver targeted “ads online, via email or through direct mail”.

The tracking and ad targeting associated with the gigabit service cannot be avoided using browser privacy settings: as AT&T explained, the program “works independently of your browser’s privacy settings regarding cookies, do-not-track and private browsing.” In other words, AT&T is performing deep packet inspection, a controversial practice through which internet service providers, by virtue of their privileged position, monitor all the internet traffic of their subscribers and collect data on the content of those communications.

What if customers do not want to be spied on by their internet service providers? AT&T allows gigabit service subscribers to opt out – for a $29 fee per month.

Many will not even notice this options exists, and many more are already stretching their budget to get the high-speed ‘net they need for school or work, making this an even uglier move from AT&T. Not only that, but purely from a business standpoint this move reeks as well. With privacy a top concern for individuals and organizations of all kinds these days, many will likely avoid a service that’s proven twice already it’s willing to violate that right. And, of course, we can’t forget the bevy of bad press discovery of this “feature” has brought about.

Bad show, AT&T. We’ll wait for Google Fiber.

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For more resources, see the Free Management Library topic: Crisis Management
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[Jonathan Bernstein is president of Bernstein Crisis Management, Inc., an international crisis management consultancy, author of Manager’s Guide to Crisis Management and Keeping the Wolves at Bay – Media Training. Erik Bernstein is vice president for the firm, and also editor of its newsletter, Crisis Manager]

Could this promotion cause more harm than good?

It’s common to see brands unintentionally create threats to their own reputations in the process of promotion, and we believe Delta’s latest email campaign is one such example. Have a look:

This example was forwarded by our colleague Phil Cox, who posed the question, “Why is Delta only promising 20 minutes or less until the end of March?”, and we doubt he’s the only one thinking along those lines. While it’s a great guarantee, the fact that it’s only for a small promotional period is just as likely to be salt in old memories of lost or long-delayed bags as it is an enticing promise, surely not what Delta was aiming for.

Meeting legal obligations doesn’t win you any favors in the court of public opinion

Auto recalls have been big news over the past couple years. One of the most serious came as a result of General Motors’ ignition switch issues, which have reportedly caused more 50 deaths over the whopping 11 years the issue went unaddressed. GM’s response, however, isn’t coming anywhere near living up to the degree of the crisis.

Instead of handling claims in a way that demonstrated compassion and personal care, GM outsourced victim’s claims to a dispute-resolution attorney, a move many see as a way to create distance between the brand and the fallout from an insanely callous business practice that cost many their lives. Not only that, but reports state as many as 3,000 of the just-over 4,000 claims submitted have been thrown out by this attorney, some for reasons as outrageous as the fact that the person killed was a passenger in the car and not the owner/driver. Of course in any case like this there are false claims submitted, but public sentiment and statements from the family of victims clearly show the process is causing more problems than it solves as far as GM’s reputation goes.

Even worse, despite begging from U.S. lawmakers, GM closed claim submissions on January 31.

We can’t speak to GM’s intent, but what this looks like to the public is a massive company trying to avoid as much damage as possible. Remember, you can be as technically correct as you want, but the court of public opinion judges on feeling and perception, not merely fact.

A rare corporate apology done right

The Anthem hack, which exposed the personal information of as many as 80 million customers, put the healthcare provider in an ugly situation. Not only were its own computer security team’s credentials stolen and used to access private information, but it was revealed that the data was not encrypted. This left customers more than a little upset, but by showing its understanding of their feelings Anthem in its apologetic email the organization took a big step in the direction of successful crisis management.

We constantly catch companies forgetting one or another of our Three C’s of Credibility – confidence, competence, and compassion – in their apologies, but Anthem nailed all three. While this letter is but a small part of the crisis management required for a breach of this size and sensitivity, it did its job by showing anxious and upset stakeholders that Anthem understands how they feel and is working to make things right again.

[Editor’s note: We welcome another insightful guest post from Issue Outcomes’ Tony Jaques as he shares some perspective on the flood of “outrage” we see on a near-daily basis.]

Much ado about nothing?

Social media has proved a powerful tool for raising legitimate issues onto the public agenda. But it has also facilitated a flood of confected issues and manufactured outrage.

Identifying the difference between the two is now an emerging challenge for issue managers and other senior executives. When can you reasonably ignore a confected issue and when might a real issue slip under the radar and cause reputational damage?

The extent of manufactured outrage was on display recently when JP Morgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon used a mild ‘profanity’ when speaking to analysts. Discussing the bank’s disappointing quarterly results he said the firm needed to be more careful to “stop stepping in dog****.”

Hardly earth-shaking. Far worse can be heard on network television every night of the week. Was it wise? No. Did it detract from the bank’s message on its financial position? Maybe. Did it warrant a blizzard of outrage from over-excited commentators? Absolutely not. The bank quite rightly treated the commentary for what it was and moved on.

Another example was when First Lady Michelle Obama arrived in Saudi Arabia without her hair covered. America’s enemies and critics expressed outrage at a perceived insult to Islam, while the President’s supporters described it as a brave statement about women’s rights. However, objective observers say it was neither, and was entirely in line with well-established protocol followed by a who’s who of high-profile women visitors to the Kingdom, including Laura Bush, Hillary Clinton, Angela Merkel and Condaleeza Rice.

The problem when facing false outrage is that it’s far too easy to feel a need to explain and apologise. We know from risk guru Peter Sandman that risk is a function of hazard (what kills you) and outrage (what makes you upset) and that hazard and outrage are equally real, equally measurable and equally manageable. He warns us that it’s very dangerous to dismiss outrage as “just perception.”

But manufactured outrage is something quite different. In fact Scott Adams (of Dilbert fame) recently coined a new word – outragism – and defined it as the act of generating public outrage by quoting famous people out of context. His purpose, he said, is to arm victims of false accusations with a word that has equal weight to the accusation.

The reality is that corporations and other organisations can equally be victims of ‘outragism’ or other forms of manufactured outrage. This is not an invitation to ignore legitimate issues and concerns. Many companies have paid a very high price for this mistake. Think no further than United Airlines famously mishandling the broken guitar claim of singer Dave Carroll, who responded by posting a song about it on Youtube. It severely damaged the airline’s reputation and, at most recent count, had accumulated more than 14 million views.

Deciding whether something is a substantive concern or merely trivial is a challenging judgement call for companies everywhere. It demands wisdom and judgement … and strong nerves.

Or rather, lack thereof

Comcast, already one of the most hated companies in the world, drew yet more (well-deserved) vitriol early this month after it was revealed that customers were having the names on their accounts changed to things like “a-hole”, “whore”, “dummy”, and “super bitch”, most likely by angry phone reps. The first of these incidents came to light in late January on the blog of consumer report Chris Elliott, and here’s Comcast’s response:

It’s a privilege to have customers use our products and to have them invite us into their homes. Each and every customer deserves to be treated with respect, and in a recent situation with a customer in Spokane that clearly didn’t happen.

We have apologized to our customer for this unacceptable situation and addressed it directly with the employee who will no longer be working on behalf of Comcast. We’re also looking at a number of technical solutions that would prevent it from happening moving forward.

We took this opportunity to reinforce with each employee just how important respect is to our culture. In every interaction we have with a customer, we need to show them respect, patience, and enthusiasm to provide them with an excellent experience.

The culture of a company is the collective habits of its people – we have great people at Comcast and we need to treat customers with the respect they deserve. Respect is not just how we speak with customers, but also respect for their time and making it much easier for them to interact with us … whether it’s solving a problem, ordering service or simply asking a question.

We’re working hard to transform the customer experience and all of our employees play an important role in making that happen. We’ll take every opportunity to learn from our mistakes and fix issues to make their experience better.

Since then several more cases have come to light, making the above statement’s angle of the name-calling being limited to one disgruntled employee, as well as the promise to reinforce with employees how important respect is, seem disingenuous at best. Elliot did manage to get a brief statement from Comcast’s senior VP of customer service, who shared the following:

“We’re retraining our teams on the importance of making name changes properly,” he said. “We’re looking for automated solutions to prevent this from happening in the future.”

Comcast says it will follow up with each customer, offer an apology and “do whatever it takes to make things right,” says Karinshak.

That Comcast’s Vice President of customer service is viewing this as a problem fixable through automation tells you all you need to know. The company culture at the cable giant is clearly sick, and they’re busy treating the symptoms instead of the cause. With major threats like Google Fiber looming, Comcast needs to hop on the crisis management wagon quickly, or it could very well find itself nothing more than a bad memory in its customers’ past down the road.