For anyone working in corporate PR in Australia the Toyota recall issue deserves study as an example of one of the best “how-not-to-do-it’ in crisis management.
For those newer to the game it will provide some valuable insights into processes and pitfalls in a genuine crisis.
For PR ‘veterans’ like myself, who have been around the block a few times, it will likely bring back a few memories.
In a crisis there are three key determinants in how successful they are handled:
1) What’s the company’s culture and attitude to disclosure?
This is where Toyota’s problems begin (as do those of so many companies). Tom Gable, a San Deigo PR guy who was part of a international PR group I belonged to many years ago, has a great blog that backgrounds Toyota’s real failings in this area.
Tom, apart from his own insights, provides some telling quotes from a Feb 6 article in the Wall Street Journal, the best of which I think is: “In Japan there is a proverb, ‘If it stinks, put a lid on it”. Alas, this seems to have been Toyota’s approach to its burgeoning safety crisis”.
Then Ken Makovsky, one of the smartest PR guys I’ve ever worked with, who has managed to grow one of New York’s largest independent PR agencies – and resist being taken over by the voracious ad agency conglomerates – has a nice little commentary piece.
After concluding that all the fundamentals of crisis management communications are being violated, he ends by posing the question – “Is Toyota suffering from a case of ‘historical amnesia’ so profound that the company’s communications efforts have collapsed in exhaustion?”
2) Who’s controlling the communication?
The blog Ishmael’s Corner fromLou Hoffman hits the nail right on the head when he says “I am convinced every crisis reaches a fork in the road in which a company must make a choice on who’s leading the charge, legal or common sense”.
He then does a great job of analysing three Open Letter’s in the US from Toyota (its best to go back and start from his first one) showing how they seem to have moved from a legal to a communication approach. For those who have been through these exercises it will likely bring back memories!
3) Who’s fronting for the organisation?
This is the nightmare that many in PR, who have the task of being the organisation’s spokesperson, dread. It’s the ‘job from hell’. In some cases you can feel that you are the sacrificial lamb. You need the ability to turn penetrating media questions from negative to positive, to be fluent and right ‘on message’.
When it comes to Australia, regrettably, I don’t think Glenn Campbell, Toyota’s local spokesperson ( a former client and probably the most sensitive, conscientious PR professional I have worked with) did the job that was needed with TV or radio. He appeared a tad defensive, he got a little tangled in his delivery and his messaging didn’t come out as I am sure he had hoped. Probably a 7/10 – but when a 10/10 was needed!
However, it would be grossly unfair to shoot the messenger. As I think is clear the basic problem is with the organisation, its culture and apparent attitude and a ‘disconnect’ with the real world (can you believe it was still running TV adverts for the Prius the day Campbell was fronting the media announcing a recall!).
So what’s the take out from all this?
There are many Australian PR Directors and Managers who work for organizations with overseas masters who would privately concede that either because of Toyota-like in-built cultural issues, or simply because there’s a lack of understanding as to how things are done in Australia, their worst nightmare is a crisis or product recall.
In fact my own experience is that it is only five years ago I had to create from the bottom-up a complete crisis management plan, including protocols and processes, for the Australian and New Zealand subsidiary of one of Europe’s largest conglomerates. What we did, and the questions and issues that this exercise created, ended up prompting Head Office to follow ANZ’s lead and start to put an international crisis framework in place!
The bottom line is that the Toyota episode, which clearly still has some twists and turns left in it, should provide the motivation to review or audit just how prepared you are to face a crisis – and most importantly, if you have overseas masters, what processes and protocols exist between you and they.
PS. You might be interested in, or get some value from, two articles I have previously written in ‘PR Influences’.
1) Media Relations: What type of spokesperson works best?
2) Media Relations: How well prepared are your management to talk to the media?
|
|
|
|
|
 |
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Grant, I very much agree with your analysis. As an American-based crisis management consultant, I have worked with both U.S. companies doing business in Japan and also Japanese-owned businesses operating on U.S. soil. For those clients, I have had to navigate the dangerous waters of Tokyo-centered decision making on more than a few occasions — and it’s NOT conducive to effective crisis response (or prevention, for that matter). Bravo and keep up the good work.
Jonathan Bernstein
President
Bernstein Crisis Management, Inc.
http://www.bernsteincrisismanagement.com
Grant, Good take on what should happen – but hasn’t. Many other reports agree with the Japanese dictum of “Put a lide on it” that you reference. Others point to local spokespeople being shackled and unsupported by Head Office. The seriousness of this was almost totally lost in the many comments posted to mumbrella for the same story. Marketing folk saying what was needed was: a new television commercial, that twtter could be used to solve the crisis and many other similar social media remedies. No one thought about audiences and messages – owners, employees, potential buyers, dealer networks and the like. No one even thought to ask whether Toyota actually had a comprehensive Issues and Crises Plan that should have had a massive recall such as this already mapped out and accounted for. This whole debacle points to a need for many organisations to go back to basics so they can avoide the very same scenario unfolding around their brand.