The last thing that a company wants is to face a crisis. The tumult over a number of tainted children’s toys shipped from outside of the U.S. left 2007 holiday shoppers looking, at times, for U.S. produced alternatives. The recent controversies over tainted spinach, toothpaste, ground beef, dog food, and tomatoes, though mostly rooted out and removed from store shelves, continue to impact shopping habits. It seems that even the most well known companies, from a large toymaker like Mattel to a national supermarket chain such as Kroger, aren’t immune to the damage caused by crisis.
So what’s the best way to respond? In the book Damage Control: Why Everything You Know About Crisis Management is Wrong, authors Eric Dezenhall and John Weber explore the tricky business of public relations efforts after a company crisis, and how a traditional approach of showing remorse and remaining positive may not always be the best approach. Instead, the duo argues in their book that a proactive stance, strong leadership, an adaptive nature, and an understanding of the marketplace and the political forces at play are the better approaches.
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