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10 Must-haves for your crisis communications playbook

Posted on Mar. 8, 2024  /  Subscribe 0

As public relations professionals, it’s not a matter of if there will be a next crisis, it’s a matter of when the next crisis will take place. Even more important, it’s consistently preparing for that next crisis to be and creating, updating and optimizing your organization’s crisis playbook. Working at an energy company I’m constantly updating our natural gas crisis playbook in the event an incident takes place so that we know what we’re going to do, when we’re going to execute and how we’re going to communicate as soon as possible. 

Here are 10 things you need to include in your crisis communications plan. 

1. Know your key players. Knowing the relevant teams and their contact information is step one. Understanding the organizational chart is crucial to ensuring everyone is on the same page. 

2. Understand roles. Ensure everyone is clear on their roles and responsibilities for when an incident takes place. If teams have rotating on-call schedules, make sure you have access to those so you understand who to contact. These roles can include but aren’t limited to, scribes/note-takers, facilitators, spokespersons/subject matter experts (for media relations) and more.

3. Know your approval process. Identify the specific leaders, members of legal, etc., to request approval before communications are issued internally or externally, and have an established process.

4. Map out all the necessary processes. Having links to all necessary how-to docs, overviews of the teams’ processes, etc., will keep you from searching through the whole shared drive when time is precious.

5. Prepare holding statements. Make sure you have a prepared statement for every scenario you can fathom and get approvals from leaders now so that it’s just a matter of plugging in specifics when an incident unfolds. Those placeholders should allude to the timeliness, injuries, cause, etc., but the basics are in place and structured for succinct and efficient execution.

6. Team integration. Establish a process and location to relay updates in real-time to stay up-to-date on the incident across all internal teams. 

7. Media list. Have your relevant media publications at the ready with contact information and strong relationships identified. These folks will be some of your best allies in disseminating information. 

8. Appendix of examples. Any materials that you might need to reference, reuse or update during incidents, such as FAQs, customer service talking points, call scripts, etc.

9. Regularly update. Update your crisis guide with the latest information, personnel, etc., at least quarterly. Reflect on each incident to track areas of improvement and update the plan during those days as well.

These crisis playbook tips have been very helpful for me to make crisis communications more efficient and transparent to all critical audiences. 

Megan Bonelli is a Senior Communications Strategist with DTE Energy and is the 2024 Detroit PRSA Incoming President/VP. 

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