A Lot of Examples of Corporate Crises

 In many ways, a recently published book, "The Crisis Casebook" by Edward Segal, is a quick read on how to respond to crises. Segal conveniently summarizes key points from his previous book at the beginning and the end of this book. The bulk is alphabetically arranged summaries of recent crises by different organizations starting with the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, and ending with [Jeff] Zucker of CNN. (Why this was under Z for Zucker and not C for CNN, I don’t know.) With each scenario, the author describes the crisis, the initial reaction, any later reaction and often advice from different crisis professionals in PR, HR, safety, law, etc. 

The author makes several key points. One is that an organization’s leadership most often doesn’t have the experience, skills or list of resources to deal with a crisis. They’re not hired because they deal with crises; they’re hired because, more often than not, their previous employment stints had avoided crises. Thus, this book is a handy quick guidebook to get a leadership team on its feet in a situation that could affect an organization’s survival, reputation or ability to grow.

If there’s a fault in this book, it’s the over abundance of real-life situations to absorb. How much overlap is there? What distinguishes this example from all others? In some ways, the author seemed to want to highlight situations he or his friends consulted on; it’s not evident Segal did, but the plethora of scenarios seems indulgent.

The last chapter—the 10 R’s of Crisis Management—may be worth the price of the book. And is a useful guide for anyone creating a crisis handbook or contingency plan, which every organization should have. I once had to wing it with regards to what should be covered in such a plan by reference to several publications. This is a handy single reference.

It’s also helpful for property, casualty, cybersecurity and employment practices insurers to use as a checklist for their clients.

I’m appreciative that the publisher provided an advanced copy to review back in May.