This post originally appeared on Paul Barton's "Just My Type" blog and we received full permission to re-run the content on this blog.
Over the years, Paul Barton has become a great friend of mine. We originally "met" via Twitter, but have since reconnected several times at IABC World Conferences.
In this post, he pulled together 20 objectives for employee communicators that I thought were simply brilliant. I'd like to see if anybody can put up an argument against any of them. Check out Paul's 20 guiding principles for employee communications.
Strategic communications help a business achieve its objectives. That is their purpose.
Effective communications are those that produce measurable results and they can be a competitive differentiator.
There are costs associated with communicating, but there can be costs associated with not communicating as well. Internal communications seek cost-effective and creative solutions to solve complex communications challenges.
Employees are drowning in information, but starving for understanding. Our job is to make the important interesting.
Credibility is the foundation upon which effective communication is built. Unless it is believed, a message has no worth.
Face-to-face communication is the most desirable form of communication because it is immediate, personal and interactive. Most employees say their immediate supervisor is their preferred and most credible source of information about the business.
Communication is, by definition, a two-way process. Feedback mechanisms must be part of every employee communication.
Communication is a management responsibility. Internal Communications supports leaders by serving as consultants, facilitators and resource partners.
As in any effective strategy, form should follow function. The medium is the message.
Employees should learn of important events affecting them and their company from an internal source rather than an external source. Well-informed employees can serve as informal ambassadors of the company.
The more important the information is personally to the receiver, the fewer exposures are needed to make an impression. Make your communications relevant.
True effectiveness in communication is the ability to influence and change behavior. Changing behaviors is a long, slow process and therefore measurement of effective communications must be taken over time.
The case for change should be found in the marketplace. For change to occur, employees must move through these stages: awareness, understanding, acceptance and commitment. You cannot skip a step. Formal communications (particularly written communications) are most effective in promoting awareness and understanding. Informal communications (leader behaviors, unwritten rules, management decisions, openness, risk-taking tolerance, etc.) are necessary to reach full commitment.
External sources are defacto employee communications and therefore external messaging should be aligned with internal strategies. Likewise, employees are informal ambassadors of an organization and therefore internal messaging should be aligned with external strategies. Every internal communication should be written as if it will be read by the news media.
Rumors are created to fill communications voids. Fill those voids with valid information. A phrase like “Unfortunately, we have more questions than answers right now but we’re aware of the problem, we’re working on it and we’ll keep you updated with any news” goes a long ways to keep the rumor mill from grinding out of control.
Well-defined communication processes and procedures are the foundation for creativity. Key message libraries, templates, crisis plans, etc. free up time for creativity and continuous improvement.
The overall tone of employee communications directly reflects the relationship an organization has with its employees. The best tone for strategic communications is the Voice of the Brand, which is primarily what the company is but also what the company is striving to be.
With better information, better business decisions can be made. Employees need to understand the “what” and the “why” to be fully engaged.
Well-informed employees are more satisfied, more creative, more productive and more committed.
A common trait among successful companies is open and honest communications with all their key audiences, especially their employees.
Pretty great, eh? Truth be told, each of these principles could be its own blog post. And maybe I'll do just that.
If you'd like to learn more about Paul, you can follow him on Twitter (@PaulBartonABC) or connect with him on LinkedIn. He is a proud Iowa St. Cyclone, but more importantly has tremendous experience with internal communication, having worked at Hawaiian Airlines, PetSmart and America West Airlines in his career.
Rather than bother everybody's Twitter stream with updates, I thought it would be better to provide presentation thoughts here (and serves as good note-taking for me).
Sebastian White, JetBlue Airways: “How Culture Drives Business Performance”
JetBlue is now the largest airline in New York City.
Focus on service starts inside with a fanatacism toward culture: Safety, Caring, Integrity, Fun and Passion.
To combat declining JD Power scores, they created a "Culture is Service" to drive improved business results.
JetBlue asked front-facing employees what's getting in their way of providing magnificent customer service to employees.
In the summits, employees had to write an essay about why they should attend these working sessions to help provide effective business communication.
JetBlue uses NetPromoter to provide a score that impact employee communication.
All 14,000 employees at jetBlue have email access and the intranet is the hub of all internal communication activity. The intranet is available outside the corporate firewall and it's open to comments. With the relaunch, employees were told to stop sending email.
JetBlue's intranet site also features industry news from other airlines.
They use videos and podcasts, even as responses to crisis communication, so that employees can stay in the loop.
JetBlue's recommendation: "Throw in a contest and people will pay attention." They even name their jets with the "blue" name in them.
They encourage customers and employees to post pictures on JetBlue's Flickr page. These photos then get used internally.
Rather than bother everybody's Twitter stream with updates, I thought it would be better to provide presentation thoughts here (and serves as good note-taking for me).
Mark Mills, Nationwide Insurance: "Connecting Employees with the Brand"
Using a powerful brand can most definitely help drive engagement.
68% of customers are turned away by an employee's indifferent attitude.
Corporate reputation is how you are perceived. A brand is how a company wants to be perceived.
Social media has brought about brand hate. So easy for customers to leave reviews and potential customers become reactionary.
Employee communications must be helping to deliver the brand promise to employees so that they become brand ambassadors.
A company's culture is the collective behavior of all employees, some of which will be good and other parts will be bad.
When the brand says "On Your Side," employees must live that.
"I Care" is a customer outreach effort that puts the brand "On Your Side" in action.
Nationwide has launched a mobile app (currently just Blackberry) so that remote employees can access the intranet on their smartphones. They are doing 10-12 stories a week on the intranet.
The company has embraced the user of Yammer (but it does require employees have an email address and Internet access).
Corporate social responsibility is one of those that often falls on the plates of corporate communication pros. And while it used to be a bit of an afterthought, this article from PRWeek, corporate social responsibility is becoming more of a differentiator for companies.
In the competitive environment that we're in, it's imperative that companies communicate their philanthropic efforts to ALL stakeholders, including employees. Here are four tips the author provides on how to create better overall engagement with CSR:
Develop clear and concise messages that demonstrate the benefit to the philanthropic cause, the value it brings to the company's corporate reputation, and the impact on the employee as an individual
Deliver the message consistently year-round and not just once a year during a charitably campaign (it has to become part of the company's DNA)
Create a means to measure the campaign's impact and communicate results to all stakeholders
Encourage feedback from employees to ensure a sense of ownership and a deeper connection to the overall CSR strategy.
We've seen many of our clients successfully use digital signage to communicate their CSR strategies and successes and has become a bigger part of overall workplace communication.
It’s another exciting day for MediaTile and our MediaCast Video Presence system that powers HumanKiosk solutions. Today we’ve been included in another ‘ideation center,’ as one of the key components of a new generation of interactive digital signage solution for banks, credit unions and other financial institutions. I’ve had the pleasure of working directly with both DBSI, and our joint partner F-2-F Live to include our HumanKiosk solution in what’s been dubbed the Future FI interactive display system.
DBSI has put a tremendous amount of effort into their ideation center for financial institutions. To give banking and credit union customers, for example, the ability to experience a wide range of the latest FI products and services to improve their businesses. FI customers, by appointment only, can visit the ideation center to personally experience the advanced products and services showcased in order to improve their business efficiency, the customer experience, and differentiate themselves from the pack. The DBSI center is a special showcase centerpiece for the FI market, unlike anything I’ve seen.
We’re extremely honored to participate in this center with our HumanKiosk solution – the fusion of interactive digital signage and remote customer service agents available for live, face-to-face engagement. Today, it’s all about getting personal with customers and we’re very happy to be part of it all.
About the HumanKiosk Solution: Powered by MediaCast Video Presence, the HumanKiosk revolutionizes marketing and customer service in point-of-sale and point-of-service environments. With the HumanKiosk businesses can humanize their brand interaction, improve the customer experience, and deliver messages with absolute control and precision. Watch our video here.
About DBSI:“For over fourteen years, DBSI Incorporated, headquartered in Chandler, Arizona has created profitable, problem solving, experience enhancing with lower cost-to-create and operate retail bank and credit union branches.”
About Face to Face live, Inc.: “Here at Face to Face Live, Inc.™, we're developing a reputation for having the most trusted, affordable, and dependable unified communication solutions on the planet.”
If you're in corporate communications, nobody needs to tell you how brutal it is. You're living it every single day. A week doesn't go by where on LinkedIn I don't see a fellow communicator who has lost their job to the almighty economy. But hope is not lost. You just have to get in shape. . . business-wise.
I came across a study from the VMA Group regarding the ever-changing role of internal communicators. And if you can get through all of the buzz words, there is some interesting information in there. According to the results, 74% of communicators have seen their role steady or even increase over the last year. This is up from 58% just 12 months before.
So basically, companies are asking communicators to put more on their plate. They are asking communicators to be more than communicators. They are asking communicators to be business partners. Finally.
So what does this mean? You need to do more than just be able to get out a newsletter, write a press release or manage an intranet. You're going to need to learn how to use Excel (God forbid), create hard-to-read charts (are there other kinds?) and be counted on in crisis situations.
Are you up to the task? You need to be. It's survival of the fittest. Your plate is full? Get a bigger plate. Those communicators who understand supply chain, can explain a balance sheet AND still communicate will survive. If you don't or can't, now's the time to learn.
Discover new technologies that are out there to make your company more communication efficient, like digital signage. If you're bringing new ideas to the table and not just helping those with their ideas, you'll start earning the trust you need. And don't be afraid to ask questions, not that you're questioning leadership but that you're wanting to understand.
Are you up for it? ____________________ Flickr image, Jennifer C.
With the dangerous weather that has hit many parts of the Midwest and South in the past month, I'm sure (and hopeful) that many crisis communication plans are being dusted off.
Crisis planning is one of those efforts that most companies do but hope they never have to enact.
I've been a part of many crisis and business continuity teams where everybody has the classic red binder that nobody thinks will ever get used.
But do employees know what to do? And what about environments where you might have customers on site. Will employees know what to tell them?
I was at a coffee shop once that lost power during a dangerous thunderstorm. Their "policy" was that if the store lost power (for whatever reason) customers had to leave. So they sent a dozen or so customers out into the storm instead of sheltering them.
We've already had one manufacturing whose facility was damaged by a tornado. They are a customer of ours after the fact. Fortunate for them, nobody was injured during the strike. However, they recognized that they didn't have a quick and visual way of notifying employees of dangerous weather on the way so that everyone could be prepared.
One of our healthcare customers have put several of their digital signage onto their emergency power network. So this way if the hospital loses power, the screens can still operate and communicate vital information to employees, patients and guests.
Now of course, digital signage will never prevent nasty weather or any emergency but it should become a part of your crisis communication activities. This works for corporate communication environments, for those where the network serves internal needs, as well as even retail, banks, etc. The same signage you use to promote products and messages can then be used to provide emergency information.
I fully appreciate what I'm proposing here is not ground-breaking, but it just shows one more example of how digital communication can dynamically change the environment and keep people safe.
Several key players in the digital signage industry have stepped up to show support for the Red Cross and the Japan relief efforts. With the launch of DOOH4Relief.com, digital signage network operators can now download content that can be run on any company's network.
rVue created the content (embedded below) and Insteo created the site, along with support from many other industry partners. Currently, anybody can download both a 15- and 30-second PSA to run on networks in a variety of formats. Plus, if you've created your own content, there's even an opportunity to upload your own stuff. Static imagery is also available through the Red Cross media library.
But what I revel in is the overall vision and future of the site. With this structure, it can support any future events where digital signage operators will want to download content regarding a national or international crisis. Let's hope these are kept to an absolute minimum but it's good to know there will be a place for networks to go to.
For more information and guidance, check out Dave Haynes's blog. Kudos to all involved.
If you'd like to help support the disaster relief for those in Japan effected by the earthquake and tsunami, you can either text REDCROSS to 90999 for a $10 donation or visit RedCross.org.
Twitter parody accounts aren't anything new. One of the most "famous" ones is @BPGlobalPR. It poppped up right after the BP oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico. And while there's nothing funny about the oil leak, the parody Twitter account did provide some comic relief during the crisis.
And that brings us to @DailyDOOHfus. For those not familiar with the digital signage industry, DailyDOOH (pronounced doo) claims to be an online digital publication of industry news and commentary. As a group, they are very visible at industry events and do help to create some noise for the digital signage space.
But DailyDOOH isn't without its band of critics. And I'm "guessing" this is the source of @DailyDOOHfus. Though while I appreciate the thought that I might have the creative ingenuity behind the account, I am not the source or the creator of the account. (I even received a direct email from DailyDOOH making the accusation.)
While this parody will likely not create anywhere near the attention that @BPGlobalPR did during the oil leak, @DailyDOOHfus might certainly create some much-needed comic relief in an industry that takes itself far too seriously.
Last week the 2011 Edelman Trust Barometer came out and it really should be read by all involved in employee communications.
The key stat that popped out to me dealt with the importance of message repetition. Basically, the more employees hear something the more likely they are to believe it. Employee communicators often times feel that they are over-communicating messages. What they don't realize is that employees are also often ignoring these messages.
Repetition is one of the strengths of digital signage. Communicators can put a core group of messages relevant to employees and keep them in a rotation.
According to the study, 3 out of 5 employees need to hear the same message at least 3-5 times before they internalize it. And yet there are even more employees who need the message delivered to them more than that.
The report also gives support for involving and featuring CEOs in critical executive communication. Back in 2009, CEOs didn't have a credibility. But that all changed in 2010. This supports getting CEOs involved in more internal communication messaging. Digital signage is one communication technology that most executives understand.
I'd definitely recommend communicators check out the rest of the report, as it talks a lot about source credibility and corporate reputation as well.
This week the West region of Verizon Wireless held their 4G LTE kickoff event in Denver and while guest speaker Mark Schlereth was a big attraction (both literally and figuratively), the speed of Verizon's 4G LTE network was front and center. It's this same speed, coupled with increased bandwidth, which allowed MediaTile to develop and deliver our Human Kiosk featuring video presence.
Speed is the key ingredient insuring there is limited lag in the peer-to-peer video exchange taking place on the MediaTile unit. Speed also gets that video call answered by the right advocate operator, speaking the right language, anywhere is the world.
MediaTile's HumanKiosk isn't like a "Skype-type" of application where two parties agree to a virtual meeting; there is an actual video call placed and when one operator is not available, that call moves to the next qualified operator until one is reached. Obviously this has to be done quickly because no one will wait too long and because 4G LTE is so fast, video operators can be found, connected, and speaking to callers in no time. All with digital signage.
The Denver event showcased a few different vertical examples - hospitality and utilities – but those who attended quickly understood how a solution like the HumanKiosk could be used for crisis communication, dynamic advertising, retail customer service, and more.
The future is 'fast' approaching...don't forget to tip your waitress.
It's that time of year for many corporate communicators when they dust off the "bad weather" portion of the crisis communication plan. I can remember having to go through the process of verifying all of the secret codes with local TV and radio stations to report closings and delays - you know - the fun stuff.
But in all seriousness, it is important the employees to know what the "inclement weather" policies are. Once your crisis plan is verified, you have to get the word out to employees. And communicators know that it's not the most exciting news to get out, but it has to get out.
For example, if your lucky enough to live in a part of the country that snows, you know that having a declared snow emergency isn't enough. Oh no. But what level of snow emergency. That's the sort of information that employees need to know. Are they supposed to come in to work or not?
Digital signage is well-suited for this type of communication. Not that digital signage doesn't work well for "breaking news" but weather policy updates don't typically fall into this category. Create some engaging content letting people know what they need to do should weather hit and put it on a rotation.
This way, if you're using digital signage for corporate communication, you know you're getting the message out there to your workforce, but aren't bugging them with reminder emails. Nobody likes those. _______________________ Photo credit The Cleveland Kid
I've never had the chance to attend the National Restaurant Association Show so yesterday was my first time. Our digital signage technology is tucked away in the AT&T booth (#5666) in the Technology Pavilion.
Yesterday I was pleased and surprised at not just the sheer volume of attendees looking at digital signage for to improve communication with customers (including menu boards) but more importantly the variety of companies. There was everything from smaller "mom and pop" restaurants looking to jazz up their customer communication all the way to some of the largest food retail chains in the country.
But some of the best conversations I had was with colleges and universities, who are looking to use digital signage for menu boards and share nutritional information but to also have the signage in place for crisis communication if needed.
All in all, those I talked to liked MediaTile's approach to digital signage. They liked the simplicity of our Digital Sign in a Box (32" on display), as well as the robustness and ease-of-use our software provides. Clearly, this was not their first exposure to signage and past hiccups seemed to be the complexity of installs. We simply don't have that.
I heard over and over, "We just want it to work." Ours works.
It's been a busy week at MediaTile, but I didn't want to miss a big announcement we made earlier this week. Later this month, we will launch and add a new emergency broadcast triggering system to MediaCast (our digital signage Software as a Service).
What's unique about the Emergency Media Trigger (as we're calling it) is that in integrates within legacy emergency communication systems. This is especially huge for educational institutions and corporate communication departments who are always looking for effective and simple ways of delivering crisis communication without having to retrace steps.
The graphic below does a great job of showing how digital signage won't necessarily replace other emergency communciation methods but can augment them in a seamless and integrated manner. Based on what I heard at the Summit for Emergency & Disaster Planning, schools and college campuses are open and interested in making sure their crisis information gets delivered to their students.
Nobody wants to be "the guy" who has to run to back to their desk in an emergency to send an alert. This is why the Emergency Media Trigger will enable network operators to simply send an email, as an example, to interrupt regularly scheduled content while automatically triggering an emergency message to play across the entire network. A second "all clear" external trigger will reset the network to its previously scheduled programming. It can even be more automated through our API.
I enjoy speaking in front of large groups. But that doesn't mean it's easy. At the 6th Annual Summit for Emergency & Disaster Planning, the audience was largely from educational institutions. But there were teachers, and administrators, and principals, and health and safety directors, and fire chiefs, and you get the point. It's tough making a presentation that's then relevant to all of those groups.
Plus, I had the second-to-last slot so I was pleased with many stuck around for the full day. I was surprised to see so many hands raised when I asked if their college or school system used digital signage. I would have liked to have dug further but time was short.
Following is my presentation on how digital signage can enhance crisis communication both in a proactive and reactive way. The fact is the best crisis communication takes place before an incident begins. Two of the other speakers provided a great segway for me. One said, "The name of the game is simply to get the information out." The other? "Make the best use of technology." That's exactly was digital signage is.
All in all, there seemed to be a lot of great ideas exchanged in how to make schools safer and more prepared should a catastrophe of any kind happen. Let's all be thankful there are people like that looking out for the kiddos and college students.
That's the title of my topic at the 6th Annual Emergency & Disaster Planning conference in Toronto. The folks at the Strategy Institute always put on a good show.
I'm honored to present at the show, but am equally interested to hear what the other speakers have to say. I would imagine this is a hungry audience, especially with so many public institutions concerned over a potential flu epidemic. The two-day conference is focused on the education sector. Just glancing through some of the other topics and you see words like "infectious disease," "lockdowns," and "shooter incidents." It just goes to show the challenge facing administrators and health workers these days.
I'm going to focus on how digital signage can be a tremendous asset in crisis communication. The exact description reads like this:
Emergency Broadcast Alert Systems provide educational campus communicators more flexibility and control when broadcasting in crises or emergency situations. Come and learn how digital signage networks are: • Programming and structuring support for a variety of alert levels, including zoned notices, campus-related emergencies, weather alerts, and other crisis-management • Being integrated into existing emergency and crisis management systems • Managing to prevent crises from escalating • Understand how deploying the right technology can enhance the life-saving capability at your campus.
I'm on the Alumni Board of Directors at Butler University and we recently discussed how colleges are preparing for a potential H1N1 outbreak. I can't imagine the challenges faced by colleges when students are packed in there. And let's be honest, many college students aren't exactly known for first-rate hygiene practices.
I'm out at MediaTile HQ in Scotts Valley, CA, this week so I'm a bit tied up in meetings. I thought it was a good time to pull together another list of my "clicks that click." These are a smattering of news items I've picked up over the last week or so that are related to communication in the workplace, social media AND/or digital signage. _______
At last June's IABC World Conference, I was asked about the trends I was seeing in corporate communications and what did I see around the corner. My response was that eventually communications would switch into recovery mode and that companies would have to respond to keep employees around. With a nice Labor Day theme, Jeanette Paladino agrees that companies should be ratcheting up their communications. (She mentions intranets, newsletters and face-to-face, but not digital signage. I'm sure it's just oversight.) Jennifer Bull over at Good Company shares our sentiment. _______
Global business communication is often a tough nut to crack, but Dave Meyer provides 10 tips for global communicators on his Communication Nation blog. All 10 are solid global communication tips, but I especially love #1 (get outside your fish bowl) and #6 (engage). I'm not sure if Dave did his graphics or not, but they are great. _______
Though I'm headed to the circus this weekend, I'm not what you'd call a big fan of clowns. But allegedly you can use scary clowns to improve employee engagement. Go figure. I'd put up the photo but I'm going to stick with the fish. _______
Apparently, more and more companies and organizations are looking at Twitter to help during crisis communication. Communicating to employees during a crisis has long been a challenge. Digital signage can help on site, but Twitter could become a huge resource for those employees who are off-site or remote. All they'd have to do is follow the corporate account.
I was asked this very question on a conference call yesterday. It's a company who's already doing a lot with communication. They have an electronic newsletter that comes out once a week, driving traffic to their intranet, which is also updated on a daily basis. They cut the weekly newsletter but are now doing a monthly magazine. Once a quarter, executives host town hall meetings.
So, yes, they are DOING a lot and are concerned that digital signage might be overkill. The problem is that it appears as though employees are not responding to the mighty efforts by the corporate communication department. And that's a big problem if employees are not responding.
I've asked them to talk to their employees to see what they think about putting electronic signs up around their campus, alerting them to the "quick hit" messages of the day/week and its use for crisis communication.
I think they'll find that employees will respond positively to it. Newsletters get tossed. Emails get ignored. Town halls get missed. Intranets get buried.
Digital signage may just be exactly what they need. Stay tuned.
Everybody has fears. It's okay to be afraid. It's human nature. My greatest fear? Llamas. Don't trust them. Never have, never will.
But what are your corporate communication fears? I'm sure that the economy has many corp comm professionals uneasy but that's not unique the in the communication field. That's everybody across every industry and profession.
Because of the economy, are you afraid to take chances or challenge the status quo? Probably so. At the end of the day, most of us need that paycheck so we don't risk our jobs for the sake of being a better communicator.
But being a better communicator is exactly what we all must become. Crisis communication has practically become synonymous with employee communications. Now more than ever is the time to prove to your businesses and organizations exactly why they need communicators.
So it's okay to have fears. But this is not a time to cower in the face of challenges.
I want to hear what you're afraid of in corporate communications? Whatever it is, it can't be nearly as bad as an angry llama.
Growing up, I couldn't tell you how many times I heard that when I was a kid. AND it was always an annoyance because it seemed interrupt my GI Joe cartoons. And thankfully, it always only seemed to be a test. But the Emergency Broadcast System was in place a valuable crisis communication tool, giving the government the ability to alert communities if there was a crisis at hand.
We are now giving that same ability to MediaTile digital signage network operators. Just announced last week, users can now implement what's called an Emergency Media Trigger (EMT), allowing them to interrupt their normal broadcast with an emergency message to be played on the screens. It's designed to integrate within existing emergency notification systems and control centers on college campuses and at corporations.
The EMT feature will enable network operators to use an external triggering mechanism, such as email, to interrupt a regularly scheduled program while automatically triggering an emergency message to play across a digital signage network. A second "all clear" external trigger will reset the network to its previously scheduled programming.
It is scheduled for release late summer, and will be supported on all installed MediaTile displays and networks.
Think about how important this could be for your crisis communication planning at your company or college campus. It's comforting to know that you would now have the ability to interrupt you normal messaging to convert your network into a vital communication tool during a crisis.
Though it's probably something you never hope you have to use, it's nice to know you'll have it if you need it.
This post originally appeared on Paul Barton's "Just My Type" blog and we received full permission to re-run the content on this blog. 
It’s another exciting day for MediaTile and our MediaCast Video Presence system that powers HumanKiosk solutions. Today we’ve been included in another ‘ideation center,’ as one of the key components of a new generation of interactive digital signage solution for banks, credit unions and other financial institutions. I’ve had the pleasure of working directly with both DBSI, and our joint partner F-2-F Live to include our HumanKiosk solution in what’s been dubbed the Future FI interactive display system.
DBSI has put a tremendous amount of effort into their ideation center for financial institutions. To give banking and credit union customers, for example, the ability to experience a wide range of the latest FI products and services to improve their businesses. FI customers, by appointment only, can visit the ideation center to personally experience the advanced products and services showcased in order to improve their business efficiency, the customer experience, and differentiate themselves from the pack. The DBSI center is a special showcase centerpiece for the FI market, unlike anything I’ve seen. 
If you're in corporate communications, nobody needs to tell you how brutal it is. You're living it every single day. A week doesn't go by where on 
Crisis planning is one of those efforts that most companies do but hope they never have to enact.
I've been a part of many crisis and business continuity teams where everybody has the classic red binder that nobody thinks will ever get used. 
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