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Crisis Communication Conference Provides Useful Resources & Tools

It has been said that it takes a lifetime to build a reputation and only seconds to destroy it. And an organization’s success – or failure – in managing a crisis can have a long-term effect on how that organization is viewed.

At the Northeast Ohio Public Health Partnership’s 2011 Public Information Officers (PIO) conference, which was held in Independence in late July, valuable advice was shared by experts, including local crisis communications gurus Hennes Paynter Communications. Key during a crisis, they say, is expressing concern, providing accurate information, and staying in touch with relevant publics, including victims, employees and customers, bankers, suppliers and others. In addition to traditional means of communications – telephone, e-mail, the media – Hennes Paynter suggests using social media to communicate information.

Additional conference presenters provided valuable information on:

• Delivering critical information to the media.
• Becoming more confident when approaching the media with critical/non-critical information.
• Communicating with functional needs populations during a crisis.
• Generating unified media messages that are understandable at all levels by using plain language.

For additional details on the information presented at the conference, please contact Julie Cox at 216.255.3611 or at julie.cox@chanet.org.