Page 90 - Crisis Communication Practical PR Strategies

Calamities 71
7
1

We had a routine that every Friday evening a briefcase left
the building with up-dated tapes of all our records, files,
stocks, price files, management and financial accounts, the
lot. On the morning the fire occurred, it was possible for the
accountant to go down the road to a neighbouring house,
which was owned by one of our senior executives, and collect
the financial records of the company in a brief case. We took
them into Digital’s office on the North Circular Road and we
had the company’s records on computer that same day. We
paid the wages that Friday by re-running the run of the pre-
vious week and we paid the creditors that Thursday.

Unusually, the two crises that Superquinn faced resulted in very
little media involvement. While Superquinn and its owner were
well known throughout the country through its innovations and
the PR-savvy nature of the business, these crises were local.
Apart from reporting on the fires and the occasional media
enquiry about rebuilding progress, there was little media
interest. The focus in each case was on direct business-to-cus-
tomer communication and to emphasize the company’s reputa-
tion as an organization that cares about its customers and staff.
The lesson for board and senior managers faced with similar
situations is: act fast. Clear and decisive decision making is
crucial, as is preparation to ensure business continuity and well
directed communication. And, crucially, don’t desert your princi-
ples. Don’t change your behaviour. The decision to rebuild
rather than repair Superquinn in Blanchardstown was driven by
the need to preserve a reputation for freshness.
If a business has a clear focus and has a reputation built on
clear principles, deserting these principles in time of crisis will
make it difficult, if not impossible, to recover from any damage
caused by the crisis.

Conclusion

This chapter has dealt with what could be described as accidents
waiting to happen – in the sense that airline crashes are as predicable
as crashes in any form of transport and that fire can strike anywhere at
any time to any building.