Organizational crises have become increasingly regular and devastating. Crises pose major threats to an organization through damage of corporate reputation. A Crisis is an unexpected event that poses both a financial and a reputational threat that can disrupt the operations of an organization. Crises can also cause financial, physical and emotional damage to stakeholders. While some crises have early warning signals thereby prevented, others are not detectable in advance. The field of public relations is cognizant of the value of reputations. One manifestation of reputation concern is the concept of reputational capital. The quality of relationships that organizations establish with stakeholders is significantly determined by its reputational capital. It acts as the social assets and the regard in which the organization and brand are held.
Given that organizations accumulate reputational capital over time, a crisis can inflict some reputational damage and result in a loss of the reputational capital. Thus, the organization must be prepared to directly respond to crises to maintain their reputation as different stakeholders including employees, community members, customers, stockholders and suppliers can be adversely affected by a crisis. In the recent past, there has been a growing body of crisis management research that has emerged. Crisis management research focuses on how communication can best be used in the event of a crisis to protect the organization’s reputation. One of such theories is the situation crisis communication theory developed by W. Timothy Coombs. This paper discusses Situational Crisis Communication Theory and applies the theory to illustrative cases example of current three crises. It also demonstrates the theory’s practical applications and potential areas of additional academic research based on the theory.
Situational Crisis Communication Theory
Situational Crisis Communication Theory is an influential theory in public relations field. The theory is an empirically tested method for selecting crisis response strategies. Coombs introduced the Situational Crisis Communication Theory in 1995 as an approach to crisis communication. Within the last decade, the theory has been refined, tested and developed it into a more consistent theory. Situational Crisis Communication Theory consists of three core elements. The first element is that of the crisis situation. The second element is that of crisis response strategies. The third element incorporates crisis response strategies as well as a system for matching the crisis situation. The theory recommends the selection of crisis response strategies that fit the nature of the crisis situation.
Accordingly, reputation is impacted through the information stakeholders receive about an organization. Through various interactions, stakeholders receive information about an organization in the form of mediated reports and second-hand information. Thus, reputations are evaluative, and a point of comparison is necessary. Stakeholders evaluate what they know about an organization to various standards to establish whether or not an organization meets its expectations about how it should behave. An expectation gap or the failure to meet expectations negatively impacts the organization. An organization’s reputation is based in large part on how different stakeholders evaluate its ability to meet their expectations.
Coombs created Situational Crisis Communication Theory as an experimentally based theory to provide communicators scientific with evidence to guide their decisions. It is based on the premise that the actions taken by an organization in post-crisis depend on the crisis situation. Situational Crisis Communication Theory identified how diverse aspects of a crisis situation impacts the attributions about the crisis as well as reputations held by stakeholders. Thus, understanding potential stakeholders’ response to a crisis should inform the post-crisis communication. Coombs provides crisis managers with summary guidelines on different crisis response strategy. He uses empirical evidence to support his theory and provides an evidence-based guide for the assessment and response to crises so as to provide a basis for making informed, beneficial and strategic decisions (Sisco, 2012).
Situational Crisis Communication Theory is rooted in Attribution Theory. Attribution Theory suggests that individuals continually look to find causes for different events, particularly if those events are unexpected and negative. Individuals tend to react emotionally when they attribute responsibility for an event. Particularly for organizations, attributions of the cause of the event draw emotional reactions from stakeholders. Negative emotions are common when the organization is held responsible as the cause of a crisis. Negative emotions impact future interactions between stakeholders and the organization. Changes in interaction can be observed through changed behaviors like purchases and references. Attribution Theory is the first links between crisis events and crisis responses. Attributions theory formed the basis for Situational Crisis Communication Theory. Coombs employed Attribution Theory to predict the degree of potential reputational threat that may result from a crisis. The prediction may guide crisis managers on response strategies targeted towards minimizing damage. Coombs also employs image restoration theory as developed William Benoit’s in his conceptualization of reputational threat and responsibility by taking into consideration the idea that perception is primary to the evaluation of both components. When stakeholders make out that the organization is responsibility, a reputational threat arises, and the organization is held to blame.
Coombs suggests that understanding the crisis situation as well as the severity of the reputational threat posed by the crisis is the key to determining the most appropriate strategy to respond to the crisis. The reputational threat is how extent a crisis could affect an organization in case no move in response to the crisis. Crisis history, Post-crisis responsibility, and prior relational reputation are the main factors that influence reputation threat. Post-crisis responsibility is how different stakeholders hold the organization responsible for the crisis. Therefore, crisis managers must first determine the crisis in order to effectively assess the level of reputational threat (Schwarz, 2008).
Situational Crisis Communication Theory suggests that what the organization says and how it communicates with its stakeholders influences their perceptions of the organization. These perceptions can shape how stakeholders behave or emotionally react towards the organization. As a result, communication decisions made by crisis managers determine their reaction. It is critical that crisis managers act strategically for the purpose of maintaining the organization’s reputation. Coombs notes that Crisis response strategies protect the organization’s reputations through shaping attributions of the crisis, changing perceptions of the organization in crisis and reducing the negative impacts generated by the crisis.
Future research of the theory
While it is imperative to recognize the genre related to different crisis situations and the variety of communication strategies available to organizations, the discursive activities of multiple actors should be taken into account. Researchers often treat the different components of crisis communication as objective choices, consequently obscuring the distinctively communicative character of crises and their resolutions. Additionally, future research should assess how different crisis types are perceived. Through the scant research on the Situational Crisis Communication Theory are researchers paying much attention to ensuring that there is a category for each type of possible crisis. Not all types of crisis may fit into the suggested types of crisis. Some hypothetical crisis that can severely affect organizations stakeholders may not fit any of the different types of crises. Where there is no room for a crisis type of a certain caliber, then a crisis manager may be conjured as all assumptions in crisis management must be accurate if they are to be used to recommend plans of action for crisis managers.
Case studies
To explore Situational Crisis Communication Theory further, a case study of a crisis that different organizations have experienced in the recent past will be employed for this paper. These crises affected and involved multiple groups of stakeholders, such as employees, customers, suppliers and the government.
Volkswagen crisis
Volkswagen, an automaker was involved in a crisis involving rigging of emissions tests and consequent deceiving the public on the emission of its diesel brands. The firm evaded regulators by employing a ‘defeat device. It also violated its ‘clean diesel’ branding. The firm company did not disclose the information. The crisis poses a serious threat to the company and is believed to have the potential to spill over to other Volkswagen brands such as Porsche and Audi. To manage the crisis, the company needed to effectively engage the stakeholders and correct the mistake by engineering and retrofitting an appliance that brings emissions to standard. Volkswagen brand faced billions of dollars in a major tarnish to the brand name. The crisis could have a large impact on many different levels: economically, environmentally, and politically as well as the potential for class-action lawsuits and more (Arthur, 2016)
Lufthansa is one of the largest airlines in Europe in terms of fleet size and overall passengers carried. In the wake of the destructive revelations surrounding the Germanwings crash, it is an example of good crisis communication. Several days after the crash that killed 150 people, news emerged that the 27-year old pilot Andreas Lubitz, who reportedly suffered from depression intentionally flew the plane into the mountains. The organization demonstrated an ideal level of commitment and dedication. Previous airlines disasters including Malaysian Airlines demonstrated how critical and quick crisis response is required (Jessica, 2015)
Lufthansa’s crisis
References
Arthur Solomon (2016) Repeat Offenders Top 2015 PR, Crisis List.
Jessica Davies (2015) PR experts applaud Lufthansa’s crisis communications approach to Germanwings disaster.
Schwarz, A. (2008). Covariation-based causal attributions during organizational crises: Suggestions for extending Situational Crisis Communication Theory (SCCT). International Journal of Strategic Communication, 2(1), 31-53.
Sisco, H. F. (2012). Crisis: An examination of the applicability of situational crisis communication theory. Journal of Public Relations Research, 24(1), 1-17.
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