Business environments can present many challenges to having a long life, and one of those challenges concerns how to carry out the crisis management effectively and when they appear. Or even anticipate these situations.
In fact, this challenge goes beyond knowing what to do when a crisis occurs, but involves planning situations that can generate a crisis, also thinking about the aspect of prevention.
Crises that can involve a company also impact aspects such as brand reputation and financial issues, as well as can lead to legal problems.
The situations that generate crises can be diverse, starting internally - from processes, errors and decisions - or even externally, which involves the market as a whole or even customer expectations.
So some scenarios and events that can lead to crises are:
- customer dissatisfaction;
- rumors involving the deal;
- professional or customer accidents;
- quality problems in batches of products;
- supply problems due to high suppliers.
In view of this, companies need to develop skills that are directed towards planning and market analysis, in order to prevent crises, avoid them and even already know how to solve them (if they arise).
With this scenario for companies, in this article we will bring some tips aimed at managing crises that will help from small to large businesses, regardless of whether they work with the sale of gas fryer or with the provision of industrial automation services.
Understand what a business crisis is
To talk about what a business crisis is, it is essential to understand the situation as a problem that the company can face.
The problems that companies face are daily, but when the crisis occurs it is because there was an unexpected situation, of high proportion or a more incisive factor of wear and tear within the enterprise.
Several sectors are subject to crisis, either due to adequacy of accesses based on security keys or a problem with a product that has reached the customer.
The problems may still be related to a scandal in the corporation, an environmental accident, among several other factors that are at odds with the good practices and values of the business and its public.
In other words, a crisis goes beyond the daily problems that are experienced, such as financial or conflict management, but which can also arise from problems that are accentuated on a daily basis.
The crisis management process
From this brief definition of what a crisis is within the company, it is worth emphasizing how the crisis management process works.
When we talk about crisis management, we refer to various actions and strategies that can be carried out to reduce the impacts of an event with the potential to become a crisis or even actions that aim to reduce/eliminate the damages of a crisis scenario that has already It's running.
That is, when there is good crisis management, managers are able to make assertive decisions that reduce the impacts on the company and its development.
Regarding these impacts, we can highlight situations related not only to finance issues, but also reputation problems.
Thus, there are some elements that need to be well defined.
One of them is the good training of leaders and managers, so that they can guide their employees on practices, processes and postures, as well as be prepared for contact with the press.
It is important for the company to understand that it is not only the manager who needs to be ready for a crisis, but also its employees. That way, we've separated some tips that will help you right now.
Tips for better crisis management in the company
From the understanding of what a crisis is in the business environment, as well as the process of managing a crisis can be carried out, we will present 4 tips that are essential in this process of risk control and better brand positioning. Check the details below.
Develop a crisis-focused manual
The first tip to improve the company's crisis management is aimed at a preventive perspective, but also a preparation process on what to do if a crisis occurs.
Any company is subject to suffering crises, from one that works with the forklift rental even companies that work with a hospital environment, for example.
That's why developing a crisis-focused manual, how to go about positioning and which channels to use, in each potential crisis, is so important.
Basically, this manual can contain information about situations that can cause an image crisis for the company, as well as some actions that can be taken to avoid this.
In addition, this manual may contain information on how managers can behave, as well as the company's own employees, in the face of a crisis situation and, if necessary, to appear in front of the media.
It is worth highlighting that this manual is worth developing by strategic teams, ranging from the communications sector, to management itself, the legal and accounting, among others.
Align press responses with the communications sector
One of the fundamental issues for a accounting advice or from another segment is to align with the communication team's proposal, above all, the Press office.
This is important because, depending on the size of the company and its influence in society, some type of problem may occur that generates visibility in the local, national or international media.
That is, there may be an impact on the institution's image more broadly, which causes several problems for the company, as well as losses of partnerships.
Therefore, the press office develops some strategies to align responses and train spokespersons (who are the people who represent the institution and who are able to grant interviews in the press).
There are some general tips regarding the company's contact with the press, which can be highlighted:
- meet the press and not run away from the answers;
- prepare the spokespersons through actions of media training;
- not isolate yourself and wait for the crisis to “pass”;
- monitor what has been said about your company in the press;
- choose which is the best form of service for the press.
For example, if your company elevator maintenance to get involved in any image crisis, it is necessary that this be clarified for the press and for the population in a clear way, bringing the measures that will be taken.
Subsequently, it is important to adopt actions to reposition the brand.
A company can apologize and admit that it was wrong, what it cannot do is provide false information or simply ignore the situation in the hope that the crisis will pass.
One of the ways to prepare for and prevent a crisis is through what we call clipping, that is, monitoring what is said about your company in the media.
In this way, it is possible to verify what has been said, in order to understand how the company's image is in other spaces and ways of dealing with crises as soon as they are identified, or even recover the relevance of the business after some risk situation.
It is important to emphasize that, with globalization and the insertion of companies in social networks, it is essential that this verification and monitoring takes place in the digital environment as well.
Train the team for crisis situations
Its team consists of the company's internal customers and employees.
Employees need to be valued and to be aware of what has been happening with the company.
Imagine that your company is involved in an image crisis that is being publicized in the press, but the employees themselves do not know exactly what happened or how to act.
This action is undoubtedly very negative for a business, be it a car financer or a parts dealer.
After all, in addition to the insecurity that it can bring to the organizational climate, they are also an important part of dealing with the crisis and better image management, being spokespersons for the business.
That is, your company's employees need to know what is happening and what guidance on how to act, how to proceed, what to do if approached via email or even in person.
With this, it is important that managers and team leaders train their employees for image crisis situations.
This training can occur through meetings, workshops, congresses, videoconferences, simulations of how to act in a crisis, among other ideas, and can be a recycling practice, from time to time.
Interact with your team and your customers
In this aspect, our final tip concerns the process of interacting with your work team, through guidance and direct contact with the submission of content through:
- institutional email;
- corporate social network;
- Mural Journal;
- intranet.
The elements mentioned above are means of corporate communication and they contribute to putting an end to the idea of the “cordless telephone”, which unfortunately brings a cut and distorted idea, affecting the image crisis.
With the use of official channels, communication becomes more integrated, and everyone has access to the same information, bringing alignment in all teams.
Contact with your customers is also essential, whether your hospital disinfectants or another sector of the market.
This is important to have direct communication with customers, which is favored through social networks, bringing the real scenario and business values.
Thus, it is essential to develop strategies that maintain good communication and interaction with the diverse audiences that the company needs to deal with on a daily basis.
One of the strategies that can be applied to maintain the relationship and contact with both customers and employees is the delivery of gifts, as a personalized gift box.
This is the case of specific actions, but mainly of first contacts and impressions, since delivery can be the first real channel with the brand, but also a determining factor for the good image of the business - and it may have been a factor identified as potential crisis risk.
The gifts do not have the idea of “buying customers” or saying that the company was not wrong, but represent a sign of apology and add information about the company's position in relation to a given situation.
Thus, the recovery needs to take place strategically, as well as the management as a whole, preventing situations with the potential for crisis from occurring effectively.
This text was originally developed by the blog team Business Connection, where you can find hundreds of informative content about various segments.
