We know a crisis can easily kill a leader, especially those unskilled in managing crises, relating to the media and generally having a presence of ineptitude when dealing with key publics. But can a crisis elevate a leader over the long term? National Public Radio gives the question a whirl by examining Rudy Giuliani’s mayoral [...]
October 30, 2007
Michael Chertoff did an outstanding job communicating during his visit to Southern California to assess the fire situation. His comments on NPR were particularly sensible, in which he expressed passion and conveyed calmness in responding to the situation. Here is a Q&A conducted with him. Although his performance could be nitpicked in detail, Chertoff nevertheless [...]
September 30, 2007
I don’t follow sports, so I apologize for being behind the curve on Mike Grundy, football coach for Oklahoma State, who thew a temper tartrum at a press conference about a column written about one of his players. Here’s the original tirade: Here’s the response by the columnist and her editor:
September 23, 2007
I previously posted about the racial crisis in Jena, La. There is a fourth lesson to learn from this situation: No human or human system–in this case, an entire community–is immune from the general rules of public relations. When a crisis hits, things seemingly small and insignificant can quickly escalate to immense degrees. This happened [...]
September 14, 2007
Toys-R-Us appears to take an appropriate approach to addressing the issue of product safety in light of toy recalls. The strategies outlined in the statement contain a nice mix of traditional and new media, as well as bilingual recall notices. Toys-R-Us nicely embeds its key messages into the statement. The second sentence tells us the company [...]
November 28, 2007