How to communicate through unusual situations

By Annie Waite, Editor of the Internal Comms Hub (North America), Melcrum

You might have seen the news this week that Fosters Australia has been fined $1.125 million following the death of one of its employees in a tragic accident at work.

While most companies now have fairly well-rehearsed action plans for dealing with major company crises, how do you communicate with employees through and about difficult and sensitive situations, like Fosters Australia would have had to?

• "I sent a voicemail message to all employees, trying to convey the compassion of the organization and to ensure that our employees heard the news from us rather than the media. One of the biggest challenges was that it was very difficult to stay ahead of the media reporting. I learned that it’s most important to tell employees what you know when you know it, and not to wait for the full story. Just confirm the facts and share them as quickly as possible."

This is Marie Uhrich's advice, which she shares in a more detailed article on the Hub, about coping with grief at Thrivent Financial.

On the online Communicators' Network and also Melcrum's email listserv for communicators today there's been a flurry of activity connected with this topic. To prepare for surprising scenarios, this interesting approach below struck me as something that'd have a real impact on employees and provide them with worthwhile, practical information:

• "To try and generate impact we posted articles on the intranet written as news stories about scenarios that could happen and how we need to be prepared for them. They were written as if they'd really happened (although we made it clear at the end that they hadn't). This worked well."

Can you add your own unusual or emergency communication suggestions?