This is the first entry in a three-part series on what it’s like being deployed as a crisis incident public information officer. This entry covers the preparatory phase of incident response operations. When I met up for coffee with my friend and colleague Thomas McKenzie a few weeks ago, his black backpack had a wavy, […]
“Do as I say, not as I do.” I jabbed a man in the eye with a flash drive once for saying that. I prefer, “Do as I say, do as I do,” or, “Don’t do what I don’t do, don’t do what I don’t say.” (wait, what?) What was I getting ready to talk about? […]
Last year I wrote about 10 things to consider when using SM (ok, it was mostly about Twitter) as a staple in your communication toolkit. I would consider this a companion post. Actually it was part of the “10 things post” but my buddy and post-partner, Paul, likes to break the goodness into smaller chunks from […]
I’ve been called on to communicate with people affected by oil spills, natural disasters and other critical incidents. What makes communicating to people affected by these sorts of events challenging is that they feel personally threatened by circumstances outside their control and by people they may not trust. This creates mental noise, which means information […]
Recently my wife and I met up with several friends at our place and walked to the neighborhood craft brewery for conversation and beer sampling. A local food truck was stationed outside, and menus were placed here and there on the tables in the brewery tasting room – patrons could order high-end food from the truck […]
The Crisis Communicator 