The document provides an overview of crisis communication, defining a crisis and its different types, such as natural disasters and organizational misdeeds. It outlines the principles and stages of effective crisis communication, emphasizing the importance of competence, credibility, and caring in managing public relations during a crisis. Additionally, it discusses various theories related to crisis management, including image repair theory and situational crisis communication theory.

1. Crisis Communication
Muhammad Rawaha Saleem
MS Fall 2018
Department of Media & Communication Studies
Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences
International Islamic University Islamabad

2. What is Crisis?
A crisis is any event that is, or is
expected to lead to an unstable and
dangerous situation affecting an
individual, group, community, or whole
society.
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3. Types of Crisis in
Organization
⚫Natural Disaster
⚫Technological Crisis
⚫Confrontation
⚫Organizational Misdeeds
⚫Workplace Violence
⚫Rumours
⚫T
erroristAttacks
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4. Threats caused by Crisis
⚫Damages Public Safety
⚫Financial Loss to Company
⚫Company’s Reputation Loss
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5. Causes & Effects of Crises
⚫ Unsafe Conditions, injuries or deaths of a
worker will result in financial and reputation
loss of the company.
⚫ Reputation loss will have a financial impact
on the organization.
⚫ Management’s failure to understand the issue
or public opinion on it.
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⚫ Failure to effectively engage the media

6. Crisis Communication
Crisis communication is a sub-
specialty of the public
relations profession that is designed to
protect and defend an individual,
company or organization who is facing
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a public challenge to its reputation.
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7. Stages of Crisis
Communication
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8. Phases of Crisis
Communication
• Tackle a crisis
or disaster in a
calm way.
• The focus has to
shift on
rebuilding, which
can be time-
consuming and
expensive.
• Test the crisis
management
team by creating
mock crises.
• A well-laid-out
plan helps the
management to
minimize any
damage that
may occur.
Prevention Preparedness
Response
Recovery
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9. 5 C’s of Crisis Communication
⚫Competence
⚫Credibility
⚫Caring
⚫Capability
⚫Commitment
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10. Competence
⚫ PR professionals appear unsure and
tentative, since they don’t have facts or
information.
⚫ Competence of PRO based on how they
convey the message during media interviews.
⚫ PRO should prepare confidently to showcase
their competence.
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11. Credibility
The best way to gain credibility is to
concede an obvious point.
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12. Commitment
The PR Professional need to express
the deep commitment to communicate
with the general public, media and
other stake holders.
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13. Caring
⚫ PR professional should demonstrate caring
attitude towards the crisis and the victims of
the crisis.
⚫ The public will be more worried about the
victims of the crisis.
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14. Capability
PRO should be capable of resolving
the situation or solving the problem.
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15. Key Principles of Crisis
Management
⚫ Be sympathetic & apologetic
⚫ Manage information flow
⚫ Manage crisis team to focus on the event
⚫ Assume the worst case scenario
⚫ Have a trained spokesperson
⚫ Resist the aggressive approach
⚫ Understand why the media are here
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⚫
Remember all audiences

16. Nine Steps of Crisis
Response
1
2
3
4 5
6
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Response
Cycle
Verify
Situation
Conduct
Notification
Conduct
Assessment
Organize
Assignment
s
Prepare Information
and Obtain
Approvals
Release information to
media, public, partners
through arranged channels
Obtain Feedback and
Conduct Crisis Evaluation
Conduct Public Education
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Monitor Events

17. Theories in Crisis Communication
Research
⚫Image Repair Theory
⚫Situational Crisis Communication Theory
⚫Social Mediated Crisis Communication
Model
⚫Integrated Crisis Mapping Model
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18. Image Repair Theory
⚫ William established image repair theory (IRT)
based on apologia studies.
⚫ IRT assumes that image is an asset that a
person or an organization attempts to protect
during a crisis.
⚫ When the person or the organization is
attacked, the accused should draft messages
to repair its image.
⚫ Response strategies the accused should
apply during a crisis which include: deny,
evading responsibility, reducing
offensiveness, corrective action, and
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19. Situational Crisis Communication
Theory
⚫ Timothy Coombs started working on SCCT in
1995.
⚫ SCCT assumes that crises are negative
events that stakeholders attempt to attribute
responsibility.
⚫ Coombs believes crisis managers can
employ different crisis strategies according to
different crisis types.
⚫ SCCT is an audience-oriented theory which
focuses on stakeholders’ perceptions of crisis
situations.
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20. Social Mediated Crisis Communication Mode
⚫ SMCC model is introduced to investigate
crisis management in 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 five factors influence
an organizational communication during a
crisis: crisis origin, crisis type, infrastructure,
message strategy and message form.
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21. Integrated Crisis Mapping Model
⚫ Jin, Pang and Cameron introduces integrated
crisis mapping model to understand
stakeholders’ varied emotion during a crisis.
⚫ ICM assumes that people keep interpreting
their emotions during a crisis.
⚫ Another line of crisis communication research
focuses on stakeholders’ emotional changes
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in times of crises.
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22. Thanks for Listening
Any Question?
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