Crisis management: danger and opportunity?

There are hundreds of academic definitions of Public Relations but in essence we could say that the main role of PR is to manage brand reputation. Reputation influences who we buy from, work for, invest in…it plays both, the emotional and personal attachments that we have with an organisation. It is one of the most important business assets but it is so fragile. Potential threads constantly challenge it and that is basically why crisis management is one of the most important tools of Public Relations.

On the book “Risk Issues and Crisis Management” Michael Regester affirms that threads to reputation can destroy, in hours or days, an image or a brand developed and invested in over decades. That is why this treads need to be anticipated:

Christian Dior’s House tried to send Galliano to rehab so many times but the designer rejected to work on his additions. They knew that they had a silent boom in-house that one-day or another was going to exploit. What they didn’t probably expect was an anti-semitic scandal. In fact, no one could ever expected that his creative director could have said, “ I love Hitler” in the middle of a lovely café in Paris. Even though the designer denied everything at the very beginning, the surfacing of a video showing the real facts, was enough evidence to show that a real crisis was threatening the reputation of the fashion house. During the golden hour, Dior remained in silence. All news papers around the world were echoing the news and the Oscars were about to start. Natalie Portman, one of the most treasured faces of Dior, refused to wear a Galliano dress that night. It was pretty obvious that the house had to stop protecting its designer and move on. To help mitigate the damage to its reputation, the fashion house hired PR crisis firm Kekst and speaking publicly for the first time since the scandal started, Galliano made a statement:  “Anti-Semitism and racism have no part in our society. I unreservedly apologise for my behaviour in causing any offence.” In the end, Dior decided to fire him and, this time, the designer went directly to rehab.

Even though the fashion house was living its darkest moment, it had the opportunity to show that no matter what, human value goes first. In an honest statement, Dior finished its contract with the creative designer that had raised its fashion reputation to the top but also threatened to fall to the bottom.

As we have seen, a crisis can threat business’s reputation but if it is managed properly, it can be an opportunity to generate trust. That is why it is equally important to identify potential threats than react consistently when something unexpected happened.

References:

Regester, M., Larkin, J., Risk Issues and Crisis Management, third edition, Chartered Institute of Public Relations, 2005
Allen, P., John Galliano ‘goes into rehab’ and apologises unreservedly – but faces trial, Mail Online, retrieved 29th January 2012,<www.dailymail.co.uk>
Pearcy, A, Dior’s Galliano issues apology as fashion label hires PR firm, Regan’s PR Daily, retrieved 29th January 2012, <www.prdaily.com>