Crisis and Reputation Management is the twofold-process by which an organization handles major events that threaten to harm the business itself, its stakeholders, or the general public. How an organization and its leadership handle a crisis will inevitably have major influence on the public’s perception of that organization, and thus, make an impact on company reputation.
Depending on whether the crisis was handled professionally and with care, or whether mistakes and omissions took place in management, its impact on your reputation can be respectively positive or negative. Crisis management is often seen as a way to improve public relations after the damage has already been done– it’s a way to handle the fallout of the situation. In the 21st century, a large part of crisis and reputation management takes the form of monitoring and influencing perceptions of your business on social media.
While crisis management after an incident has occurred may help in the short run by softening the blow of the crisis’s impact, it is a far more profitable approach to weave strategies of crisis-prevention right into the fabric of an organization’s core processes and standard operating procedures– thus, preventing crises before they can arise. A major aspect of an effective crisis and reputation management, therefore, is proactive crisis-prevention. At Arete Publica Associates, we can help your company construct a crisis preparedness plan– giving clear guidance to relevant personnel on how to handle crises, and furthermore, how to avoid them altogether.
Crisis and Reputation Management packages Arete Publica Associates can provide for your business include:
Crisis Management (During or After a Crisis or Disaster)
The best way to handle a crisis is to prevent it from happening. However, life is unpredictable– accidents, unforeseen events, or disasters can happen– and sometimes, prevention fails. In situations where the crisis has already arisen, your business must ensure that you have established and prepared effective crisis response guidelines, and that your staff and management are aware of these plans and trained to employ them.
In your company’s times of distress, we are here to help. In these situations, we can provide your company with an ad-hoc solution, quickly tailored to your business’s unique needs in responding to a crisis that has already occurred. We can help your business develop and implement a short-term crisis management strategy, based on a timely stakeholder analysis and an impact assessment. In this management strategy, we can provide you with a crisis communications plan suited to your organization, and create training strategies for your company spokespersons, management, and staff.
Reputation Management
If you have an effective crisis prevention and preparedness plan in place and have trained your staff accordingly, then your business has made the first important step towards preventing damage to your business’s reputation, and this strategy is admirable. Handling crises with strategy and care is vital to maintaining a positive public image of your business. In some cases, a well-handled crisis, accident, or natural disaster might even have a positive impact on your business’s reputation. By helping you to manage and prevent crises, we can boost your reputation.
Crisis Prevention and Preparedness Strategy
A well thought-out prevention plan is preferable to dealing with crises after they occur. Arete Publica Associates can can assist your business in the following areas:
- Planning and analyzing; developing and implementing management systems which promote prevention and preparedness
- Developing possible risk scenarios and responses to these scenarios
- Developing prevention strategies to respond to possible risk
- Creating a crisis communications plan
- Creating training mechanisms for your staff to ensure strategy implementation
- Providing your business with a complex stakeholder response analysis
- Developing strategies for the inclusion and feedback of external stakeholders