An organization will always face a crisis, good or bad, in its lifetime. During a crisis, a PR practitioner must come up with strategies and tactics that will help an organization and its publics. The three most important steps a PR practitioner can take to manage a crisis are:
1.Determine responsibility for the crisis (who is at fault?).
2.Provide honest information to the public. (The truth and nothing but the truth!)
3. Take corrective action to deal with the crisis. (What should we do now?)
An example of PR during a crisis would be the 1982 Johnson and Johnson Tylenol tampering case. In this case, bottles of Tylenol were poisoned. Johnson and Johnson determined that the tampering was done by someone outside the company. Although Johnson and Johnson was not responsible for the tampering, the organization recalled the Tylenol and issued alerts to the public. The company took another action by placing safety seals on all future products to prevent a crisis like this happening again.
In the case of Johnson and Johnson, the crisis did benefit the organization. By recalling all of its Tylenol and creating safer seals on its products, Johnson and Johnson helped to keep its clean image. A crisis can be good for an organization.
A PR practitioner does not solve the crisis; he or she helps deal with managing the crisis. A PR practitioner is responsible for evaluating, strategizing, and coming up with plans to resolve the crisis. In other word, a PR practitioner is like a human brain. It sends messages to tell the rest of the body what to do.
