Crisis Communications Around an Employment Matter
How does an organization communicate about a challenging employment situation while avoiding potential blowback from their community?
They rely on trusted third-party guidance to navigate the crisis with a strategic course of action.
The Challenge
When an employment matter turned public and volatile, with the threat of escalating further, a global nonprofit turned to Guardian for crisis management assistance.
The PROCESS
With a goal of amicable resolution, we provided internal communications counsel and recommendations for mediation for the benefit of both parties, thus helping a private matter between employee and employer remain just that—private. During the mediation efforts, we worked with the organization’s HR, legal and communications leads to hypothesize various scenarios, and prepare custom statements and media strategies for each, ensuring they would be prepared no matter what happened.
In addition to the employment matter, a social media post in defense of one of the parties snowballed and had the risk of escalating from online misunderstandings to a physical protest. While keeping mediation efforts the priority, we helped prepare the client for the logistics of such an event, guiding them on how to receive the protesters and how to handle media requests stemming from the original situation or any protest.
The PROCESs
Thankfully for all parties, initial mediation efforts proved successful. The protest did not materialize.
When media reported on the employment matter several months later, the organization and our team were able to mobilize quickly, in large part due to the preparations from the months prior. Providing statements andmedia relations counsel, our team enabled the client to discuss details of the matter respectfully, succinctly and promptly.