This just in:
I know GAW/Paybase is not interested, but for anybody who wonders "WHAT WOULD A REAL COMPANY DO?" I could offer some advice.
Any communications towards future business partners or key customers or anybody who is highly valuable to the company must be made with extreme care. No way should you send some untrained monkeys with no planned and rehearsed strict communication guidelines to meet future key players. Any real business would loathe at the idea that these untrained monkeys would give some promise during the presentation that the company cannot keep. In this case the company cannot even know what promises are being made in these presentations. How could the GAW/paybase plan to meet those promises?
So whatever GAW/Paybase is doing would be a definite no no to any real company. This is no way to recruit future key partners that you would need to keep happy for your company to have any hope in succeeding.
Another topic. Crisis communication. GAW/Paybase motto seems to be that any questions are not answered for at least weeks. They say this is something that real companies do. Except it is exactly the opposite. Read any presentation about how a company would need to do to survive a crisis the key part is communication. For example:
http://iveybusinessjournal.com/topics/the-workplace/crisis-communications-managing-corporate-reputation-in-the-court-of-public-opinion
Quote
So what’s to be done? Ten rules for crisis management
1. Respect the role of the media. The media are not the enemy; they have direct access to the audiences you need to reach. Rather than avoiding media, use them as a conduit to communicate key messages. Prepare a statement that includes the confirmed facts; communicate what the company is doing and provide background information.
2. Communicate, communicate, communicate. The first rule of crisis management is to communicate. Early hours are critical and they set the tone for the duration of the crisis. The media’s first questions are likely to be simple and predictable:
What happened?
Where?
When did you know of the problem?
What are you doing about it?
Who’s to blame?
Were there warning signs?
How will life or property be protected or compensated?
Be as forthright as possible; tell what you know and when you became aware of it; explain who is involved and what is being done to fix the situation. Be sure to correct misinformation promptly when it emerges.
In the aftermath of the 9/11 tragedy, New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani held a press conference in the ruins of Lower Manhattan that afternoon. In the coming days, he became the reassuring voice of calm for worried residents of the city.
In the hours, days and months after the 1998 crash of Swissair 111 in Nova Scotia, the Transportation Safety Board of Canada held a series of media updates on the status of the crash investigation, and provided regular safety alerts to the international aviation community.
When Pepsi-Cola heard first reports of syringes being found in soft drink bottles in 1993 — which turned out to be hoaxes — it launched a broad communications offensive to reassure consumers. Tactics included media relations and interviews, company open houses, video news releases, third-party endorsement and consumer hotlines.
Remaining silent or appearing removed, perhaps on the advice of legal counsel, tends to enrage the public and other stakeholders. A balanced communications strategy must be developed that protects corporate liability while satisfying the demands of today’s information and media dynamic.
As demanding as the public may be, they are usually inclined to give an organization the benefit of the doubt in the early hours of a crisis. They judge a company and its leaders not by the incident itself — which they recognize is often beyond the control of those individuals — but by their response.
3. Take responsibility. One of the more controversial tenets of crisis management is that someone involved in a crisis must be prepared to empathize, even publicly apologize, for the events that have transpired. This is different from accepting blame. Taking responsibility means communicating what an organization is doing to remedy a situation that the media and the public have determined involve that organization in some way.
1. Respect the role of the media. The media are not the enemy; they have direct access to the audiences you need to reach. Rather than avoiding media, use them as a conduit to communicate key messages. Prepare a statement that includes the confirmed facts; communicate what the company is doing and provide background information.
2. Communicate, communicate, communicate. The first rule of crisis management is to communicate. Early hours are critical and they set the tone for the duration of the crisis. The media’s first questions are likely to be simple and predictable:
What happened?
Where?
When did you know of the problem?
What are you doing about it?
Who’s to blame?
Were there warning signs?
How will life or property be protected or compensated?
Be as forthright as possible; tell what you know and when you became aware of it; explain who is involved and what is being done to fix the situation. Be sure to correct misinformation promptly when it emerges.
In the aftermath of the 9/11 tragedy, New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani held a press conference in the ruins of Lower Manhattan that afternoon. In the coming days, he became the reassuring voice of calm for worried residents of the city.
In the hours, days and months after the 1998 crash of Swissair 111 in Nova Scotia, the Transportation Safety Board of Canada held a series of media updates on the status of the crash investigation, and provided regular safety alerts to the international aviation community.
When Pepsi-Cola heard first reports of syringes being found in soft drink bottles in 1993 — which turned out to be hoaxes — it launched a broad communications offensive to reassure consumers. Tactics included media relations and interviews, company open houses, video news releases, third-party endorsement and consumer hotlines.
Remaining silent or appearing removed, perhaps on the advice of legal counsel, tends to enrage the public and other stakeholders. A balanced communications strategy must be developed that protects corporate liability while satisfying the demands of today’s information and media dynamic.
As demanding as the public may be, they are usually inclined to give an organization the benefit of the doubt in the early hours of a crisis. They judge a company and its leaders not by the incident itself — which they recognize is often beyond the control of those individuals — but by their response.
3. Take responsibility. One of the more controversial tenets of crisis management is that someone involved in a crisis must be prepared to empathize, even publicly apologize, for the events that have transpired. This is different from accepting blame. Taking responsibility means communicating what an organization is doing to remedy a situation that the media and the public have determined involve that organization in some way.
This is how a real business and a real company handles crisis communications.
+1 ab8989 is correct.
