Samenvatting PR Artikelen – Master CW
Week 1
-
Week 2
ARTIKEL 1:
- Ndlela, M.N. (2019). Introduction. Crisis Communication: A Stakeholder Approach.
Palgrave, London.
Crises have become an inevitable and permanent feature of modern society. Some get solved behind
closed doors, others are thrust into the limelight and therefore upsetting an organization’s image. The
most obvious area of vulnerability is in social media, which enables disgruntles stakeholders to air
their grievances against an organisation. Think of the example of when a flight was overbooked and
the passenger was forcibly removed from the flight, which was filmed, shared on social media and
thus affected the airlines’ reputation negatively, causing its stock to drop.
In an era of instantaneous communications and social networking, crisis news travels faster than ever
before, making breaking news in international media channels, and viral feeds on social media
platforms. New communications technologies make the world smaller and closer, and this enhances
the visibility of many crises.
Extreme weather events are also shared on social media very often, which causes us to be aware of
such events, as well as of terror attacks, health pandemics and other human-made crises. All of these
have implications for organizations and we are becoming more aware of risks and vulnerabilities in
our societies.
The risk society (which is a book) describes how new risks created by science and social changes,
such as nuclear accidents, climatic change and genetically modified organisms, have, since the
Second World War, partly over-shadowed the old natural disasters like pests, earthquakes and
famine.
It is argued that as our technology increases, and wars increase, and we invade nature more and
more, we create systems – organizations and organizations of organizations – that increase risk for
operators, passengers and innocent bystanders.
Awareness is the beginning of the journey in crisis prevention, preparedness and eventual
management. Communication is a central component of this journey.
Defining organizational crisis:
“Crisis” has many explanations and there is thus not 1 specific description. Some crises are clearly
visible—for example, natural disasters—while others are invisible or are based on contested
perceptions, such as certain forms of organizational crises like misdeeds. An organization might be in
a crisis without its leadership knowing or acknowledging it as a crisis because they have a high
threshold for what constitutes a crisis. There is no clearly definable point at which we can say that a
minor problem has become an official crisis. It is
,argued that it is best to have a low threshold when defining crisis, and take even small episodes as
potential big threats and at least be prepared for an incident to escalate into a crisis. Neglecting
minor issues can lead to a crisis later.
All organizational crises inevitably affect stakeholder groups. Freeman defines a stakeholder as “any
group or individual who is affected by or can affect the achievement of an organization’s objective”.
Defenitions to recognize the implication of organizational crisis for sections of stakeholder groups:
1. A situation that can potentially escalate in intensity, fall under close government or media
scrutiny, jeopardize the current positive public image of an organization or interfere with
normal business operations (Flink, 1986).
2. An incident or event that poses a threat to an organization’s reputation and viability (Pearson
and Mitroff, 1993).
3. It is the perceptions of stakeholders that help to define an event as a crisis (Coombs, 2015).
He thus says that as long as some sections of the stakeholders think that an organization is in
a crisis, the organization is in a crisis.
Characteristics of organizational crisis
1. Threat: threatens the high-priority values of an organization
2. Surprise: is unexpected or unanticipated
3. Short response time: presents a restricted time in which to respond
A manager must thus recognize a threat and believe it will hinder high-priority goals,
recognize the irreparableness and degeneration of a situation if they take no action; and
finally, they must be ready to face surprises.
Three characteristics of crisis:
1. Suddenness
2. Uncertainty
3. Time compression (so decisions must be made under stress)
Classification of crisis (crisis typologies):
Crises can also be categorized according to the tempo of progression, as sudden (occur without
warning and go beyond an organization’s control) and smoldering (slow moving and not clearly
visible. Consumer activism, rumors, bribery etc.) crisis.
,Situational Crisis Communication Theory (SCCT) by Coombs divides organizational crises into three
clusters:
1. Victim cluster: when the organization has not caused the crisis and are a victim themselves
too.
2. Accidental cluster: when organizations’ actions lead to the crisis but were unintentional such
as technical breakdowns or failures.
3. Preventable cluster: when the organizations’ inappropriate actions led to the crisis such as
human errors or misconduct.
Note that one crisis can have elements cutting across categories.
Crisis management: a strategic process
Modern crisis management encompasses management strategies designed to anticipate crises,
prevent them from happening and manage them effectively once they have occurred, minimize the
damage to an organization and its stakeholders and provide valuable lessons for future management
processes.
The crisis management process is often divided into three phases:
1. Pre-crisis
2. Crisis response
3. Post-crisis
Jaques’ model presents four major phases in crisis management, with each building around a cluster
of activities:
1. Crisis preparedness (pre-crisis)
2. Crisis prevention (pre-crisis)
3. Crisis incident management (crisis response)
4. Post-crisis management
Crisis communication: has evolved from a narrow perspective where the objective of crisis
communication was to control the damage during a crisis to a much broader understanding.
, The message, medium and audience constitute the key variables of communication. Crisis
communication involves verbal and non-verbal forms of expression, and different types of
communication such as interpersonal, group and mass communication, and involves different
stakeholders.
Crisis managers have to contend with the interests of a variety of stakeholders. During the crisis,
taking into account the diversity of stakeholder groups and providing each with relevant, timely and
accurate information about the unfolding crisis is a crucial step in resolving the crisis. Success in crisis
communication entails effective stakeholder engagement throughout the crisis management cycle.
70-80% of problem solving during a crisis involves communication.
Stakeholders in a crisis can be defined as individuals, groups, communities or organizations, who may
affect, be affected by or perceive themselves to be affected by the crisis
Stakeholder approach to crisis management
A stakeholder approach in management suggests that managers should formulate and implement
processes that satisfy stakeholders’ needs in order to ensure the long-term success of the firm.
ARTIKEL 2:
- Ndlela, M.N. (2019). Stakeholder Approaches in Crisis Management. Crisis Communication:
A Stakeholder Approach. Palgrave, London.
Most approaches to crisis management are organization-centric and this negates the view
that when organizations are affected by a crisis, so too are their stakeholders. This chapter
seeks to show how having a stakeholder approach can optimize crisis management.
Success in crisis management depends largely on how timely and appropriately an
organization communicates with its stakeholders during the different phases of the crisis
management cycle.
The understanding of the stakeholder theory includes both wider and narrow
perspectives.
Wide stakeholder perspective: identifiable groups or individuals such as public interest
groups, protest groups, government agencies, competitors, employees etc.
Narrow stakeholder perspective: any identifiable group or individual on which an
organization is dependent for its continued survival and this includes employees, customer
segments, suppliers and government agencies.
There is a subtle difference between “stakeholders” and “public”: “people are
stakeholders because they are in a category affected by decisions of an organization or if
their decisions affect the organization” and “the stakeholders who are or become more
aware and active can be described as publics”.
Organizations choose stakeholders by their marketing strategies, recruiting and investment
plans, but publics arise on their own.
The central idea in stakeholder theory is that “an organization’s success is dependent on
how well it manages the relationships with key groups such as customers, employees,
suppliers, communities, financiers and others that can affect the realization of its
purpose”.
Understood as a genre of stakeholder theories instead of a monolithic theory.
Week 1
-
Week 2
ARTIKEL 1:
- Ndlela, M.N. (2019). Introduction. Crisis Communication: A Stakeholder Approach.
Palgrave, London.
Crises have become an inevitable and permanent feature of modern society. Some get solved behind
closed doors, others are thrust into the limelight and therefore upsetting an organization’s image. The
most obvious area of vulnerability is in social media, which enables disgruntles stakeholders to air
their grievances against an organisation. Think of the example of when a flight was overbooked and
the passenger was forcibly removed from the flight, which was filmed, shared on social media and
thus affected the airlines’ reputation negatively, causing its stock to drop.
In an era of instantaneous communications and social networking, crisis news travels faster than ever
before, making breaking news in international media channels, and viral feeds on social media
platforms. New communications technologies make the world smaller and closer, and this enhances
the visibility of many crises.
Extreme weather events are also shared on social media very often, which causes us to be aware of
such events, as well as of terror attacks, health pandemics and other human-made crises. All of these
have implications for organizations and we are becoming more aware of risks and vulnerabilities in
our societies.
The risk society (which is a book) describes how new risks created by science and social changes,
such as nuclear accidents, climatic change and genetically modified organisms, have, since the
Second World War, partly over-shadowed the old natural disasters like pests, earthquakes and
famine.
It is argued that as our technology increases, and wars increase, and we invade nature more and
more, we create systems – organizations and organizations of organizations – that increase risk for
operators, passengers and innocent bystanders.
Awareness is the beginning of the journey in crisis prevention, preparedness and eventual
management. Communication is a central component of this journey.
Defining organizational crisis:
“Crisis” has many explanations and there is thus not 1 specific description. Some crises are clearly
visible—for example, natural disasters—while others are invisible or are based on contested
perceptions, such as certain forms of organizational crises like misdeeds. An organization might be in
a crisis without its leadership knowing or acknowledging it as a crisis because they have a high
threshold for what constitutes a crisis. There is no clearly definable point at which we can say that a
minor problem has become an official crisis. It is
,argued that it is best to have a low threshold when defining crisis, and take even small episodes as
potential big threats and at least be prepared for an incident to escalate into a crisis. Neglecting
minor issues can lead to a crisis later.
All organizational crises inevitably affect stakeholder groups. Freeman defines a stakeholder as “any
group or individual who is affected by or can affect the achievement of an organization’s objective”.
Defenitions to recognize the implication of organizational crisis for sections of stakeholder groups:
1. A situation that can potentially escalate in intensity, fall under close government or media
scrutiny, jeopardize the current positive public image of an organization or interfere with
normal business operations (Flink, 1986).
2. An incident or event that poses a threat to an organization’s reputation and viability (Pearson
and Mitroff, 1993).
3. It is the perceptions of stakeholders that help to define an event as a crisis (Coombs, 2015).
He thus says that as long as some sections of the stakeholders think that an organization is in
a crisis, the organization is in a crisis.
Characteristics of organizational crisis
1. Threat: threatens the high-priority values of an organization
2. Surprise: is unexpected or unanticipated
3. Short response time: presents a restricted time in which to respond
A manager must thus recognize a threat and believe it will hinder high-priority goals,
recognize the irreparableness and degeneration of a situation if they take no action; and
finally, they must be ready to face surprises.
Three characteristics of crisis:
1. Suddenness
2. Uncertainty
3. Time compression (so decisions must be made under stress)
Classification of crisis (crisis typologies):
Crises can also be categorized according to the tempo of progression, as sudden (occur without
warning and go beyond an organization’s control) and smoldering (slow moving and not clearly
visible. Consumer activism, rumors, bribery etc.) crisis.
,Situational Crisis Communication Theory (SCCT) by Coombs divides organizational crises into three
clusters:
1. Victim cluster: when the organization has not caused the crisis and are a victim themselves
too.
2. Accidental cluster: when organizations’ actions lead to the crisis but were unintentional such
as technical breakdowns or failures.
3. Preventable cluster: when the organizations’ inappropriate actions led to the crisis such as
human errors or misconduct.
Note that one crisis can have elements cutting across categories.
Crisis management: a strategic process
Modern crisis management encompasses management strategies designed to anticipate crises,
prevent them from happening and manage them effectively once they have occurred, minimize the
damage to an organization and its stakeholders and provide valuable lessons for future management
processes.
The crisis management process is often divided into three phases:
1. Pre-crisis
2. Crisis response
3. Post-crisis
Jaques’ model presents four major phases in crisis management, with each building around a cluster
of activities:
1. Crisis preparedness (pre-crisis)
2. Crisis prevention (pre-crisis)
3. Crisis incident management (crisis response)
4. Post-crisis management
Crisis communication: has evolved from a narrow perspective where the objective of crisis
communication was to control the damage during a crisis to a much broader understanding.
, The message, medium and audience constitute the key variables of communication. Crisis
communication involves verbal and non-verbal forms of expression, and different types of
communication such as interpersonal, group and mass communication, and involves different
stakeholders.
Crisis managers have to contend with the interests of a variety of stakeholders. During the crisis,
taking into account the diversity of stakeholder groups and providing each with relevant, timely and
accurate information about the unfolding crisis is a crucial step in resolving the crisis. Success in crisis
communication entails effective stakeholder engagement throughout the crisis management cycle.
70-80% of problem solving during a crisis involves communication.
Stakeholders in a crisis can be defined as individuals, groups, communities or organizations, who may
affect, be affected by or perceive themselves to be affected by the crisis
Stakeholder approach to crisis management
A stakeholder approach in management suggests that managers should formulate and implement
processes that satisfy stakeholders’ needs in order to ensure the long-term success of the firm.
ARTIKEL 2:
- Ndlela, M.N. (2019). Stakeholder Approaches in Crisis Management. Crisis Communication:
A Stakeholder Approach. Palgrave, London.
Most approaches to crisis management are organization-centric and this negates the view
that when organizations are affected by a crisis, so too are their stakeholders. This chapter
seeks to show how having a stakeholder approach can optimize crisis management.
Success in crisis management depends largely on how timely and appropriately an
organization communicates with its stakeholders during the different phases of the crisis
management cycle.
The understanding of the stakeholder theory includes both wider and narrow
perspectives.
Wide stakeholder perspective: identifiable groups or individuals such as public interest
groups, protest groups, government agencies, competitors, employees etc.
Narrow stakeholder perspective: any identifiable group or individual on which an
organization is dependent for its continued survival and this includes employees, customer
segments, suppliers and government agencies.
There is a subtle difference between “stakeholders” and “public”: “people are
stakeholders because they are in a category affected by decisions of an organization or if
their decisions affect the organization” and “the stakeholders who are or become more
aware and active can be described as publics”.
Organizations choose stakeholders by their marketing strategies, recruiting and investment
plans, but publics arise on their own.
The central idea in stakeholder theory is that “an organization’s success is dependent on
how well it manages the relationships with key groups such as customers, employees,
suppliers, communities, financiers and others that can affect the realization of its
purpose”.
Understood as a genre of stakeholder theories instead of a monolithic theory.
