Contemporary Challenges in Reputation and Crisis Management
Emeka Opara
To put this peice in context, it is vital to respond to the question: What is crisis? I will offer three definitions and one of them is mine.
The United Kingdom’s (UK) Department for Business Innovation and Skills describes a crisis as “an abnormal situation, or even perception, which is beyond the scope of everyday business and which threatens the operation, safety and reputation of an organisation.”
Seeger, Sellnow and Ulmer (2003) offer the following definition: “A specific, unexpected, and nonroutine event or series of events that create high levels of uncertainty and threaten or are perceived to threaten an organization’s high priority goals” (p. 233).
Finally, Emeka Oparah’s definition of Crisis: “An incident, predicted or not, which tends to disrupt business and life and leads to losses and setback.” My definition is borne out of my 24 years’ experience in corporate communications and reasonable reading. It takes into cognizance all kinds of crises including Tsunamis and Tornadoes, Workers’ strikes and even economic downturn, like Nigeria’s which is solely dependent on oil prices and is, by consequence, experiencing exchange rate devaluation and spiralling inflation or Greece, which is hanging on a lifeline provided by the European Central Bank.
Lest we degenerate into the feisty politics of Nigeria’s economy, let me quickly delve into the next logical question: What is Crisis Management? According to Drennan and McConnell (2007), Crisis Management is the process of identifying a potential issue or crisis and coordinating organizational or inter-organisational response as necessary.
For me, Crisis Management is a process by which leadership anticipates, prevents and deals with a disruptive situation with a view to minimizing the impact. The key points to note, regardless of the definition you choose is that crisis management entails as follows; a process-so it involves a series of activities over time, is driven from the top-so it’s a management function, designed to deal with the situation (crisis) and of course, it should minimise the impact on the business or entity. Classification or types of crisis
Perhaps, the easiest categorisation of crisis is that which looks at it from the perspective of damage or disruption, in which case, we have:
Violent Crisis: Incidents which lead to destruction of lives and property like Tsunamis, earthquakes, Terror attacks, plane crashes, strikes (some), accidents, building collapse, gas-leaks, and so on. Here, 9/11 attack on the World Trade Centre is, perhaps, one of the most memorable. The MH370 (Malaysian Airliner) which disappeared in broad daylight over the Pacific is another. The Boko Haram bomb attacks on the United Nations Building in Abuja and Airtel Nigeria Kano Office also come to mind. Of course, there is the world famous Chernobyl Gas Plant explosion in India. Then, there is the “mysterious” collapse of a building at the Synagogue of all Nations Church of Pastor T. B. Joshua. Non-violent
Conversely, these incidents may not immediately lead to loss of lives and property but are potentially dangerous with deleterious impact. For example, product recall, computer systems virus or hack attack, scandals, workers’ strike, etc. We all remember WikiLeaks of 2012, the embarrassing collapse of Janet Jackson’s dress while performing at the Grammy Awards of 2007, the phone-hacking scandal in the UK and the naked photos of two adulterous Airtel Uganda employees that went viral in 2010.
Regardless of the type, a crisis is a crisis. It is potentially dangerous and can destroy the reputation of an individual or organization, if not well managed. Watergate Scandal, for example, brought down Richard Nixon and denied him the chance of re-election after he served out J.F. Kennedy’s term. Writing in the Harvard Business Review on Crisis Management, Norman R. Augustine, aformer Chairman of America Red Cross, stated: “Almost every crisis contains within itself the seeds of success and the roots of failure.”[i] The essence of crisis management is, therefore, finding, cultivating and harvesting that potential success, Augustine posited.
It is very important for any management or leadership to acknowledge the possibility of crisis and take deliberate steps to deal with it. The best step so far is to establish a Crisis Management Teamtasked with conducting a business risk analysis to identify potential risks and possible crises and developing strategies and plans for avoiding, minimizing and dealing with them.
Still reading from Norman R. Augustine, I would like to analyse business crises by identifying six stages.
Avoiding the Crisis: Prevention, it is said, is better than cure. Therefore, Management must take necessary steps to prevent crisis as much as possible. By identifying and anticipating potential crises, it is easy to avoid them. Nothing is perfect in life; avoidance cannot be perfect but by quickly implementing a new welfare scheme, a strike by Non-Academic Staff Union of University (NASU) can be avoided, for example.
Preparing to manage the crisis: It is important to note that Noah did not wait for the flood before he started building the ark. Because most crises never give a warning, it is important to prepare for the rainy days. This is quite literally so for those who live in areas prone to flooding! Some crucial preparatory steps recommend themselves here namely establishing a crisis centre, setting up a crisis team, designing some communication. Most organizations conduct Fire Drills, as part of preparation. With terrorism now a reality in Nigeria, most organizations conduct evacuation drills and other exercises in anticipation of the unfortunate incident of a terror attack. Even Internal Communications on “How to identify a terrorist” is most helpful in present day Nigeria.
Recognising the crisis: Recognising crisis can be as simple as perceiving the odour of smoke or gas or fuel. It can even be merely by observing restiveness among junior workers, who might be planning a strike. With growing terrorism, airports seek out and destroy baggage left unattended hence the repeated announcements you often hear. Recognizing potential danger is crucial in managing it.
Containing the crisis: Here the fire is already burning or the bomb has gone off or the naked image of the Chief Executive has gone viral. You have to stop it! If you have prepared and recognized the crisis, you can sure contain it. The crisis team is in place, we know the spokesperson, the communication is ready and there is a devil’s advocate to challenge the effort of the team (very crucial to bring out the best in the team!).
Resolving the crisis: A crisis must not fester. The faster it is resolved the better. The first 24 hours can make or mar the crisis management effort. When employees of Airtel Nigeria Call Centre went on strike and then rampage in 2012, the management had to deal with it swiftly-even if it seriously mismanaged the recognition and avoidance stage, as you will see shortly.
Profiting from the crisis: This looks most unlikely considering what happens in a terror attack or plane crash, but as Augustine stated, there is always a silver lining in the dark clouds. That is what he described as “seeds of success” embedded in a crisis. The profit is usually in terms of re-building or clawing back reputation and consequently revenue and profit. There are rare cases where a crisis, like the fall of Constantinople, has turned to a blessing in disguise. The Stakeholder Connection
Keeping your stakeholders in mind is critical to the successful management of a crisis, because not only can one bad apple spoil the whole bunch, but you need them as advocates too. It is, therefore, a business imperative to know who these stakeholders are and understand their psychology and predilections. With that, you can engage them dutifully before, during and after a crisis.
For a telecommunications operator like Airtel Nigeria, the stakeholders will include the investors, employees and their families and friends, media, government, regulatory agencies, business partners, competition and customers. Soon, I will tell you how we mismanaged some of these stakeholders during our Abuja Call Centre Crisis and paid dearly for it.
It goes without saying that each of these stakeholder groups are relevant and also powerful and can certainly play major roles in resolving or aggravating a crisis, as the case may be. What to do in the face of a crisis
According to Mark Herford, how an organization responds in the early stages of a crisis can make a big difference to its reputation.
The first 24 hours of a crisis is very crucial as I already stated above. If these hours are mismanaged, then the crisis could fester and become more costly in terms of consequence or impact. There are, therefore, 10 Best Practice Principles available to an organization to help it minimize reputation damage, according to Herford in his Crisis Make or Break-The first 24 hours published on the IPRA website[ii]. I will just list them here for discussion: get ready before the crisis hits, mobilize your communication effort as quickly-or even more quicklythan your operational response, activate the crisis team and the crisis room, get out early-control or influence the dialogue from the outset and nsure you get an initial statement out to the media and key internal and external stakeholders within the first hour of learning of the crisis.
Others are; lead with the facts, show sympathy and concern for all affected parties (Sympathy, concern, facts, solution and Reassurance), put the incident into context of time and space, do not speculate on the cause of the incident or the likely outcome and provide regular updates to all stakeholders. Changing Realities; Contemporary challenges
All I have done in the foregoing is to present the classical approach to understanding and dealing with crisis and how it affects corporate reputation. With some luck, all of these will work out fine if followed carefully and strictly. However, that was before the dawn of Social Media or New Media!
The environment of crisis communication has changed drastically with the evolution of social media and citizen journalism. I will tell you why and how, if you do not know. I will also share with you how this became a major undoing of Airtel Nigeria, among other challenges (some self-imposed) during the Abuja Call Centre Crisis.
Another phenomenon, which has changed the landscape of crisis management, is Terrorism. Until 9/11, not many organizations reckoned with terrorists and terrorism, but all that has changed. Ask the global Airline industry. In Nigeria, it used to be said that there could NEVER be terrorism in Nigeria because the people loved life and enjoyed it to the fullest. All that has changed with the activities of Boko Haram, which have claimed over 15, 000 lives and displaced more than 1.5 m especially in the North East. I will also share with you how Airtel Nigeria managed a Boko Haram attack on its Kano office in 2012. Airtel Nigeria Abuja Call Centre Crisis
Following the signing of a Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) Agreement with two Indian corporations, Airtel Nigeria outsourced its Call Centre in Abuja to Spanco and the one in Lagos to TechMahindra.
From the outset, the employees of the call centres viewed the deal with suspicion. Though most of them were not direct employees of Airtel Nigeria, they felt a part of the company and feared justifiably that this outsourcing will put paid to whatever claim they had to being part of Airtel. Almost immediately, there was disquiet over salaries and allowances and, in some cases, number of leave days legally accruable to employees. There were rumours that both companies would review all of these downwards; rumours fuelled by the general perception of Indian businesses as very cost-conscious, even too shrewd.
Apparently, the managers at Tech Mahindra in Lagos were handling it better than their Abuja counterparts, at least at the early stages, because on June 17, 2011, the Abuja call centre agents downed tools and refused to pick calls. Expectedly, the management of Airtel waded into the crisis given the deleterious impact it had on its customer service delivery. It ended within 24 hours, but not without serious financial and reputation cost to Airtel. There was a total media blackout because the PR team moved quickly to engage the media. The attempt of the Agents to appear on the programme of one of the television stations was scuttled.
In July, there was yet another face-off, which involved both the Abuja and Lagos agents and some of the Showroom staff across the country. Apparently, there had been increased awareness among the agents, which led them to unionize surreptitiously. They had joined the National Union of Post & Telegraph Employees (NUPTE) led by Mr. Sunday Alhassan. Recruitment had covered both call centres and showrooms and they were firmly determined to battle their employers to avoid any cut in their salaries and allowances as well as leave days. The sit-down lasted three days and massively disrupted the operations of Airtel Nigeria.
While trying to mediate between the Agents and their employers, Airtel took some steps to secure its business including re-routing call traffic to other countries and beefing up security around its facilities. For some reason, management erroneously assumed the problem was not really theirs but that of Spanco and Tech Mahindra. That was a major mistake.