Communicators’ Corner

This post is the fifth ‘Lessons Learned’ from my experiences in several Worst Case Drills (WCDs) held in 2024. Each ‘Lessons Learned’ focuses on a specific issue revealed in the WCDs that affects communicators’ ability to communicate in a crisis. I plan on posting one per week for the next several weeks. Feel free to use this information to improve your own planning or response actions. I hope it helps!

Lessons Learned I’ve posted to date:

#1: The approval dragon lives!

#2: Don’t do your old job in your new job

#3: Effective initial actions ensure effective initial messaging

#4: Build cooperation in the JIC

I’ve included a ‘Mini’ Improvement Plan for each Lesson Learned, to help you ensure your readiness in an actual incident. Each action should fit into a coffee break, unless it reveals the need for more work – no guarantees then! (But contact me if you need help!)

A quick reminder: Effective drill performance is NOT the end goal of attendance: Effective RESPONSE performance is.  Don’t fixate on ‘winning’ a drill; focus on being ready for an actual event. If a review of your drill capabilities reveals shortcomings, don’t wait for the next WCD. Fix it now!

5) Can you send content to stakeholders?

Stakeholder communication is a fact of life in a Worst Case incident. A large group of concerned stakeholders will expect to receive information from you directly. They will want to know what is happening NOW. Not communicating directly to them will impact their opinion of your organization, the effectiveness of your response and their willingness to trust you. Not a great starting point!

Despite this importance of communicating with stakeholders, WCDs seldom test your capability to disseminate information directly to them. They test your ability to draft and approve Press Releases and Incident Updates, possibly post them on a dark site to demonstrate your capability. But drills seldom include distribution to external stakeholders.

There is valid justification for not doing so. The drill environment is restricted to internal actions only. External impact and response activity are simulated. This keeps WCD costs down. Deployment is expensive. Outside activity might also draw unwanted attention from members of the public.

WCD participants are regularly reminded not even to talk about their WCD when outside the drill area. This is good advice: I once attended a terrorism exercise where participants were firmly reminded not to talk about the scenario in public areas of the host hotel. Hotel guests had overheard conversations about the simulated anthrax release and were trying to check out and flee the premises.

Given this enforced privacy, it’s obvious that sending created content to outside stakeholders in a WCD should be avoided. So we have this ‘abracadabra’ moment when drafted and approved information is magically ‘sent’ to stakeholders. A critical element of effective response isn’t actually being tested.

How does the JIC speak directly with stakeholders?

Social Media: A powerful tool for delivering message to individuals. The message can become mixed and uncontrollable. The ‘sender’ is often the ‘poster’ or the ‘commenter’ instead of the JIC. You don’t always know what your stakeholder are actually receiving. More on social media strategies in a later post!

Print and broadcast media: Absolutely a great multiplier of your message. But they’re also a ‘filter’ between what you provide and what they publish. You don’t have control over what or who they add or delete from your story.

Email distribution: If your objective is to speak directly with your affected stakeholders, you have to deliver your messages directly to them. This is typically done via email. While email is a powerful tool, it’s dependent on your ability to provide email addresses for all stakeholders who will want to receive response information from you.

How do you capture and communicate with your own stakeholders?

You actually already are. You already have access to people who are important to your organization. You just need to find them.

They’re on multiple lists within your organization, used daily to accomplish key business objectives. They’re client lists, vendor lists, government relations lists, employee lists, lists of marketing resources and so on. These lists exist. They’re updated for daily use and they each identify groups of your stakeholders. So find them and use them when you need them! A stakeholder list doesn’t accomplish much if you can’t access it or use it.

You don’t have to test it. You already know your email platform will send emails. Still, you need to make sure that you have accurate, updated stakeholder lists when you need them.

How do you test a distribution that never happens? Test the Process.

Find your stakeholder lists.

• Which lists? Start with the usual suspects: media, elected officials, employees, customers, vendors, regulators, shareholders, etc.
• Who owns the lists? Who uses them?
• Match the person to the directory
  • Media: Public Affairs
  • Elected officials: Government Relations
  • Employees: Human Resources
  • And so on….
• Ensure access and usability of each list
  • Gather 24/7 contact information for each list owner. Explain that you may need ‘their list’ immediately, at any time.
  • Gather 24/7 contact information for IT Staff. You’ll need them for website or social media support as well.
  • Ask IT Staff to ensure a rapid upload of each directory onto selected email platforms.
• Lease, don’t buy!
  • Let list owners own the lists. They’ll keep their lists updated because the need to for their own use. Just make sure you can access the list when you need it!
  • For both List owners and IT staff, be sure they understand why timely and accurate lists are so important, and don’t forget to thank them for their help.

Your first and most critical audience

Do you have access to your Response Plan’s Incident Notification List? It’s a key requirement of your organization’s Response Plan. It’s a list of organizations that will be contacted directly by telephone at the inception of the incident. Contacts include response organizations, regulators, critical facilities such as schools or hospitals, as well as neighboring facilities and businesses. They typically include a small list of local or regional media as well.

Because they are the first notified (sometimes even before you are! Another topic…), contacts listed on the Notification List are your first and most critical audience. They know what has happened and they are likely sharing it with their own stakeholders. But unless you have their email addresses, they won’t be provided additional information or updates about the response.

Improvement Plan:

• Set up your list-leasing process with list owners and IT Staff
• Review the Incident Notification List to be sure you can provide information to the listed contacts.
  • Make sure the Notification List includes email addresses. They usually don’t.
• Create a current copy of the list, in a compatible (email directory) format.
  • Open the list and call a few of the phone numbers for local notifications. Are they correct?
• If not, dedicate time to verify each number AND obtain a durable email address.
• Send your finished list to IT staff to ensure rapid uploading for use.
• Buy your list owners and IT staff donuts? Coffee?

Interested? Want more information? Contact me!

On a related note: Does your Crisis Communication Plan provide guidance and tools like this that are needed for effective stakeholder communication in a crisis? Do you worry or wonder about its capability and currency? Here’s how you can be sure:

• Ensure coordination between plans. Review both Crisis Communication Plan and Emergency Response Plan to be sure they play well together.
• Assess your Crisis Communication Plan’s capability. I use 30 specific measurements.
• Recommend Plan edits. Draft the edits needed in Plan or policy language.
• Implement Plan edits. Add or edit content needed to maximize Plan effectiveness.
• Enjoy a newfound peace of mind. Both you and your plans are ready for the worst!

I’m happy to work with you to ensure your success! Here are two steps you can take right now:

Contact me NOW! The first person to contact me to mention this post will receive a credit for 8 hours of my Plan review services.

This post is the fourth ‘Lessons Learned’ from my experiences in several Worst Case Drills (WCDs) held in 2024. Each ‘Lessons Learned’ focuses on a specific issue revealed in the WCDs that affects communicators’ ability to communicate in a crisis. I plan on posting ome each week over the next several weeks. Feel free to use this information to improve your own planning or response actions. I hope it helps!

Lessons Learned I’ve posted to date:

#1: The approval dragon lives!

#2: Don’t do your old job in your new job

#3: Effective initial actions ensure effective initial messaging

I’ve included a ‘Mini Improvement Plan’ for each Lessons Learned, to help you ensure your readiness in an actual incident. Each action should fit into a coffee break, unless it reveals the need for more work – no guarantees then! (But contact me if you need help!)

A quick reminder: Effective drill performance is NOT the end goal of attendance: Effective RESPONSE performance is.  Don’t fixate on ‘winning’ a drill; focus on being ready for an actual event. If a review of your drill capabilities reveals shortcomings, don’t wait for the next WCD. Fix it now!

4) Build cooperation in the JIC

In a major response, the Joint Information Center (JIC) will be made up of personnel representing all partner agencies in the response, as well as the Responsible Party (RP). Where do they fit, and how do they start working together? Here’s specific guidance from the Pacific Northwest Contingency Plan’s JIC manual:

“When an incident occurs, there is a high demand for fast and accurate information. Public perception is often shaped by impressions formed in the first hours of a response.

When a state environmental or emergency management agency, the USCG, or the EPA first learn about a spill, the respective PIOs should quickly contact one another to share information in an effort to release a joint media statement. The goal should be to get this first release and/or social media post approved and issued within the first two hours after notification is received.

If a Responsible Party (RP) is named, PIOs should include the RP’s lead response communicator in information sharing. The RP’s response communicator should be identified in the RP’s applicable Emergency Response Plan. The RP’s response communicator will have access to detailed information regarding the RP’s preparation and response that could be valuable in clearly describing the incident and response activities.”

Contact and Coordinate

There you have it! How to work together to communicate effectively when an incident occurs. Early contact and coordination is crucial to ensure cooperation throughout a response. By working together, response partners can share common information from multiple sources with a shared audience. This paves the way for public trust and acceptance of response actions.

How can this work out in an actual event?

How does the RP’s lead response communicator foster cooperation in early stages of a response? What practical actions should you focus on in the critical initial hours?

• Provide rapid and direct stakeholder communication from the inception of the response. Failure to communicate quickly and directly with stakeholders is equivalent to failing to respond.
  • Determine the impact of the incident on the surrounding public, including the anticipated level of stakeholder interest and sensitivity.
  • Determine the key concerns of stakeholders, including the potency of each concern.
  • Publish an Initial Statement as quickly as possible.
  • Publish appropriate Key Messages to alleviate identified key stakeholder concerns.
  • Provide additional updates, as much as possible in coordination with other agencies.
• Reach out to response agencies to coordinate ongoing stakeholder communication content.
  • Share your published response updates with other agencies.
  • Share your initial assessment of incident impact and key concerns.
  • Upon formation of a JIC, join the JIC and offer published content for initial JIC use. This content provides initial information until JIC gets up to speed.
• Commit to the long run! A JIC is made up of multiple qualified communicators, serving over the duration of the response.
  • Cooperate with other JIC members to determine which role best fits each communicator.
  • Agree with how each organization represented in the JIC will jointly share content created in the JIC. Preserve one voice for response information!
  • Bloom where you’re planted! Avoid conflict and fit in for the long run! There will be ample opportunity to fill other roles over the duration of the response.

Improvement Plan

• Determine which organizations will join Unified Command should a worst-case incident occur at your facility.
• Identify each organization’s lead PIO. They know who you are from your Emergency Response Plan, but you don’t know them.
• Add their contact information to your Crisis Communication Plan.
  • Include them with your list of internal communication resources.
  • Include them in all content distribution from the initial statement on.
• Schedule a meeting with them NOW to walk through the initial information flow in a response.
  • Know how you’ll work together before you have to!
  • Ask them for their other communicators and associated contact information.
  • If you are participating in a WCD soon, be sure to engage with the other participating communicators. Take advantage of this opportunity to start an ongoing relationship.

Interested? Want more information? Contact me!

On a related note: Does your Crisis Communication Plan provide guidance and tools needed for effective stakeholder communication in a crisis? Do you worry or wonder about its capability and currency? Here’s how you can be sure:

• Ensure coordination between plans. Review both Crisis Communication Plan and Emergency Response Plan to be sure they play well together.
• Assess your Crisis Communication Plan’s capability. I use 30 specific measurements.
• Recommend Plan edits. Draft the edits needed in Plan or policy language.
• Implement Plan edits. Add or edit content needed to maximize Plan effectiveness.
• Enjoy a newfound peace of mind. Both you and your plans are ready for the worst!

I’m happy to work with you to ensure your success! Here are two steps you can take right now:

1. Contact me to set up an appointment to discuss my Plan review process. No obligation!
2. Contact me NOW! The first person to request a meeting to discuss the process will receive a credit for the first 8 hours of my Plan review services.

The greatest of all drills is the Worst Case Drill (WCD). A WCD simulates a worst case incident to fully test an operator’s response capability. Participating in a WCD allows oil handling operations to gain a greater understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of their oil spill contingency plans, equipment, and procedures.

Since communicators usually attend only their own organizations’ WCDs, I’ve compiled a set of lessons learned from multiple WCDs that I attended into ‘Lessons Learned’ to share with current and future PIOs and JIC participants.

I’ve included a mini ‘Improvement Plan’ for each of the lessons learned. These suggestions for specific actions may help ensure readiness for an actual incident. Each Improvement Plan should fit into a coffee break, unless it reveals the need for more work – no guarantees then! (But contact me if you need help!)

I’ll be posting one Lesson Learned per week over the next several weeks. Feel free to use this information to improve your own planning or response actions. I hope they help!

A quick reminder: Effective drill performance is NOT the end goal of attendance: Effective RESPONSE performance is.  Don’t fixate on ‘winning’ a drill; focus on being ready for an actual event. If a review of your drill capabilities reveals shortcomings, don’t wait for the next WCD. Fix it now!

2)     Don’t do your old job in your new job

The primary WCD objective is to test response capability. Each section of the ICS structure is tested using specific injects to measure response effectiveness. Specific deliverables for the JIC are typically focused on:

• Effectiveness of the PIO in representing stakeholders to Incident Command.
• Effectiveness of the PIO in representing Incident Command to stakeholders.
• Ability to develop a coordinated, cooperative JIC with responding organizations’ communicators.
• Providing an appropriate level of counsel and content the JIC provides to Incident Command.
• Effectively preparing for, and conducting, a press conference or community meeting.
• Identification of stakeholder concerns and creation of content needed to address each one.
• Timeliness and pertinence of communication content.
• Effective social media management.
• And so on

Each WCD requires a strong focus on JIC structure and roles, including effective placement of each available communicator, typically directed by either policy or people: What do the Area Contingency Plan or Joint Information Center Manual prescribe for participating communicators. Who is available and what is their training?

Most JICs invoke some variant of ‘Most Qualified Individual’ (MQI): Who is the best qualified person for each position? This qualification is determined by both training and experience. Higher trained, more experienced communicators will be placed in the most critical positions.

How do you attain these positions? That’s the second reason WCDs are conducted: To offer people the opportunity to gain experience in a ‘practice’ setting that will increase performance in a real response.

A WCD provides a great opportunity to try out new roles and positions. We often jump at this opportunity, and we often run into the same issue: The stress level inherent in the drill causes us to fall back to actions we’re familiar with instead of practicing the actions needed in our new position. This is not unique to the JIC, drills or responses. It’s a common behavior in every facet of our lives: stress freezes us and causes us to seek and stay in our ‘safe place’, which is seldom the new role or behavior we need to succeed.

What happens? Let’s take a detour to fast food.

I worked my way through college at a pizza parlor, rising to the level of assistant manager. In that role, I was responsible for running the store on our busiest nights. One night, we were short staffed, running out of everything and there was a line of customers out the door. To ease the load on the pizza cooks I assigned the slowest worker to run the cash register, which gave more time between each order while managing customer expectations (nobody waits for their pizza until they’ve ordered it!).

We were out of sliced tomatoes, so I ran into the prep room to cut more. I was faster at slicing tomatoes than anyone else, so this was a best use of my time. Pretty good management decisions, right?

My boss didn’t think so: He walked into the prep room and asked what I was doing. I told him what and why. He disagreed. “No matter how good you are at slicing tomatoes, your job on a night like this is to run the register, meet the customers and keep your crew running right. It’s not about slicing tomatoes; it’s about being in front of your customers!”

What had I done wrong? I’d reverted back to my safety zone of being the fastest tomato slicer, and I’d stepped away from what was most important. My crew needed my leadership more than they needed my tomatoes.

The same thing can happen to us in a WCD – or a real response! When we step into a new role in the JIC, and we experience the stress of the new position, we can inadvertently revert to known, safe behavior. If we’ve stepped into the JIC Manager position, we might revert to writing a press release (Information Creation role) or answering inquiry calls (Inquiry Management role). If we’re trying out the PIO position, we may revert to making the JIC run better (JIC Manager role). We know these roles, and we’re safe in them. But we’re not meeting requirements of our new position. And we’re failing the response.

WCDs are rightfully touted as an opportunity to test knowledge and capability, work with people who will be next to you in a real event, and practice new roles in a safe environment. At the same time, the JIC function is being graded and the grade earned will be a part of the overall drill success or failure. So, it’s a good idea to maximize your preparation so you can maximize your capability and success!

Improvement Plan:

• Ambition is be rewarded, so go for it! Go ahead and try on a higher position!
• Read all the pertinent training materials. Take the available ICS courses.
• Remind yourself that your new role is going to be the only role you have. Resolve to perform only the functions inherent in your new role. Don’t go back to slicing tomatoes!
• Practice your new role before participating in the WCD. This requires a combination of study and a response walk-through. Participating in a walk-through with a mentor – an experienced communicator you work with, to give you a combination of knowledge and muscle memory that will stress-proof you for a drill or, more importantly, an actual event.
• Have your mentor conduct a mini-TTX with you. (What’s a mini-TTX? Ask me!)