July 7, 2025 • 58 mins
When chaos erupts, the difference between catastrophe and manageable challenge often comes down to preparation. Crisis management expert Stephanie Craig brings a lifetime of experience navigating high-pressure situations to this illuminating conversation about organizational resilience.
Growing up as the daughter of a Royal Canadian Mounted Police hostage negotiator, Stephanie developed an unusual comfort with chaos from an early age. This natural affinity, combined with formative experiences in politics and business, positioned her perfectly to guide organizations through their darkest moments. Now, as president of Kith Consulting, she shares the formula that drives her approach: "clarity plus trust equals strategic speed."
This episode delivers actionable wisdom for leaders at all levels. Stephanie reveals the critical distinction between brand and reputation—"Brand is what you own. Your reputation is what people say about you"—and explains why reputation accounts for approximately 35% of organizational value. She dismantles the dangerous "it won't happen to me" mentality that leaves many organizations vulnerable and provides a blueprint for building a core crisis team that can respond effectively when disaster strikes.
Perhaps most valuable is Stephanie's insight into how values serve as an essential touchstone during crises. Whether responding to data breaches, navigating political tensions, or engaging with social movements, organizations with clear, consistently applied values make better decisions faster. Through compelling examples from Silicon Valley's COVID response to high-profile corporate missteps, she illustrates how preparation transforms potential disasters into manageable challenges.
Don't wait until crisis hits to develop your response strategy. Listen now to build the communication infrastructure, team dynamics, and leadership mindset that will protect your organization when—not if—challenges arise.
Hey leader! Thanks for listening. For more leadership communication tips, check out https://www.thecommunicativeleader.com/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Dr. Leah OH (00:00):
Welcome to another insightful episode of the
Communicative Leader.
I'm your host, dr Leah oh, andtoday we're thrilled to
introduce you to Stephanie Craig, a renowned crisis expert who
has guided world leaders and toporganizations through their
most challenging moments.
As the president of KithConsulting, stephanie brings a
wealth of experience from therealms of politics, media and
(00:23):
business to the art of crisismanagement and organizational
resilience.
Stephanie's unique blend ofstrategic communication and
reputation management has helpedher build a stellar reputation
as she mitigates crises, repairsreputations and fortifies
organizations against futurechallenges.
(00:43):
Her impressive career includesworking with distinguished
figures like former First LadyRosalyn Carter and influential
Fortune 500 companies, offeringher unparalleled insights into
the dynamics of very high-stakessituations.
In today's episode, we're goingto delve into crucial topics
such as the core principles ofcrisis management, the role of
(01:07):
communication during turbulenttimes and how leaders can build
resilient crisis-ready teams.
Stephanie shares her strategiesfor safeguarding your
organization's reputation andovercoming vulnerabilities that
a lot of times we tend tooverlook, vulnerabilities that a
lot of times we tend tooverlook.
(01:27):
So, if you are eager to learnhow to steer your organization
through these stormy seas andemerge even stronger, this
episode is packed with expertadvice and practical strategies
to enhance your crisis readinessand solidify your leadership
effectiveness.
Let's have some fun.
Hello and welcome to theCommunicative Leader hosted by
me, dr Leah Omilion- Hodges.
(01:49):
My friends call me Dr O.
I'm a professor ofcommunication and a leadership
communication expert.
On the Communicative Leader,we're working to make your work
life what you want it to be.
Welcome, stephanie.
I'm so excited to have you onthe Communicative Leader and
(02:10):
before we begin our conversation, I was hoping you could share a
little bit about your journey.
So you've been in politics,media and business.
You're a crisis expert andpresident of Kith Consulting, so
just give us a little bit ofthat pathway.
Stephanie Craig (02:25):
Well, leah, thank you so much for having me.
I'm really thrilled to be here.
I think the whole story of howI got here starts a long time
ago, and I can literally say aland far away.
I was born in the CanadianArctic.
My father was a Royal CanadianMounted Police Officer you know
(02:45):
those guys with the hats and thered jackets, and so you know I,
my mom, used to say that I'vebeen through every natural
disaster except a tsunami, and Idefinitely choose not to cross
that one off the list.
Yeah, don't want that one, butalso it's.
I come from a line of of peoplethat find common chaos.
(03:08):
Um, my grandfather was in worldwar II at Normandy.
My dad, as I mentioned, was aRoyal Canadian Mounted Police
officer who specialized in umhostage negotiation.
Lovely thing to emulate.
Really not appreciating as ateenager.
Um, lovely thing to emulatereally not appreciating as a
teenager, but really.
(03:32):
I always, even as a kid, found acalming sense of being in the
middle of chaos Excuse me, leahand I graduated from college in
the middle of a 500-year flood.
Oh, it was literally thelargest up until Hurricane
Katrina.
It was the largest evacuationin the US since the Civil War,
and so, you know, just reallyfound myself in a calm spot,
(03:57):
being able to just help folksand do what we needed to do, and
that just led me into a careerin politics, which helped me
refine this, this real, umdesire to, to take control, and
I I freely admit that I am acontrol freak and that it has
served me well.
Um, and so, being in in inpolitics it's.
(04:20):
It really helped me learn frompeople that knew how to adapt
and in in crisis.
That is something that we try toimpart upon our clients is,
when they're in a crisis, teachthem how to adapt.
Our preferred way of workingwith people honestly is to teach
(04:40):
them how to mitigate a crisis,how to spot a crisis and how to
recover from one faster.
So being able to teach folkshow to adapt and how to
structure themselves in a waythat makes all of those things
easier something I learnedthrough politics a real hard
(05:09):
work ethic that I have loved andhave taken with me everywhere
and have through.
First my first part of my life,I got to see almost all of
Canada, and then my politicallife has taken me across the
United States to so many neatand wonderful places, and each
time I've learned a little bitmore about a region.
I've learned a little bit moreabout industry, which crisis
management itself is agnostic,but it's really helpful to be
(05:30):
that old adage an inch deep anda mile wide.
Mm, hmm.
Dr. Leah OH (05:35):
Yeah, yeah.
That is a fascinating story,stephanie, and it makes sense
and, I'm sure, positions youperfectly to be a guide during
crisis and before, and thecoaching and afterwards.
Stephanie Craig (05:51):
Absolutely.
I think that's something thatfolks expect you not to be able
to.
Well, I'm special.
We might have a data breach.
Well, unless you're a databreach expert and you have one,
no one's going to be an expertin data breach.
Well, unless you're a databreach expert and you have one,
no one's going to be an expertin data breach.
So part of the nice thing aboutthe way I've built my career
and my life, I love people.
(06:11):
I find people fascinating and Ilike to collect them, and so in
my world I have a few peoplethat are data breach experts.
So I don't have to be a databreach expert, I just have to
know one Exactly.
Dr. Leah OH (06:23):
Yes, exactly, that's a.
It reminds me my spouse is likeI don't need to know what our
calendar is, you know what it isright.
Like when you have thoseconnections, it really can make
you really yeah.
So let's think about some highstakes leadership and I know,
stephanie, you have guided manyprominent figures and
organizations through reallychallenging situations and I was
(06:46):
hoping you could share one ofthese high stakes situations
that really impacted orotherwise shaped your personal
approach to crisis management.
Stephanie Craig (06:58):
It's actually it's not been one particular
issue.
As I mentioned, there was theflood, and then there's been
some other very high stakesissues that we've encountered,
and some that stick more with meare the ones that impact people
, and it's something that is notvery I guess the word I'm
(07:20):
looking for is folks don't thinkthat these people exist anymore
, but I've made it a big, bigpriority to work for people in
politics that I believed in, andone instance in particular and
it was a long, long crisissituation was I was an advisor
to the mayor of San Jose,california, during COVID and we
(07:44):
were charged with you know howare we going to take?
Because San Jose is consideredbasically the capital of Silicon
Valley and it was so highhomelessness population.
You know housing is expensiveand you know we really knew two
things we had to serve people.
We really knew two things wehad to serve people and we had
(08:09):
the talent in our own backyardto be innovative and so that
kind of those kinds of crisissituations, while long-term and
that's something people don'treally grasp Leah is that crisis
.
There are some crises that arecontained and you can be like
done, I'm moving on, and othersare a very long tail and that's
(08:33):
why I choose this one to talkabout.
There are some there are somevery sexy ones where you know we
were on the front page of everynewspaper in the world.
Uh, and that's honestly whensomebody called us too late.
If you call us beforehand, wecan do everything we can to keep
you off the campaign.
Exactly that's that's when it'stoo late.
(08:54):
You know you call us, you knowwe can help, but we prefer to
help earlier.
But the reason I talk about thatone is there were the the.
The kind of adage in in SiliconValley is they kind of got the
idea that COVID was coming alittle bit earlier than other
folks, okay, and so they startedreally planning and figuring
(09:17):
out.
It ended up with something veryrevolutionary.
It was called the SiliconValley recovery council and it
had some of the most prominentnames in tech gathering to
create a plan to support thecommunity, and that, to me, is a
really good example of you knowwhat you need to do, you figure
out what resources you need tomake an impact and then you go
(09:41):
to work and then you go to work.
Dr. Leah OH (09:47):
Yeah, and I mean and think about all of the
leadership at every level therein planning ahead of time and
making sure the right people areat the table.
And I love, too, that youstarted that by talking about
how do we serve those around us.
What a profound example, whatan incredible thing to be a part
of.
Stephanie Craig (10:02):
I mean, no one was excited about COVID,
especially when there were somany unknowns, but to be able to
be in a position to help lessenit and make it better for your
community really really powerfulthing about that that was
(10:27):
interesting is that the rightcommunicating to so many
different groups of peoplebusiness leaders, community
leaders, average citizens,business, you know, business
folks that were worrying aboutthe survivability of their own
business it required a lot ofnuanced communicating and
understanding what not changingwhat we said, but changing how
the message was delivered.
So very specific groups wouldhear what we had to say, and Sam
(10:51):
does.
The mayor who's now in Congressand one of my favorite people,
um, he was.
He's a very plain spoken personand getting those nuances is
important and he was very goodat it and it made our job a lot
easier because he understoodfrequency, he understood tone,
(11:12):
he understood audience and whenyou are trying to make people
understand that you know whatwe're doing everything we can
and we have hope that this isgoing to work.
I think it's communication isjust critical.
Dr. Leah OH (11:27):
Yeah, yeah.
And, like you said too, I thinkso many people think well, I've
posted it or I hit send, sothey're done.
Stephanie Craig (11:36):
Communication has occurred, but if people, if
the message isn't framed in away where people are going to
listen to it, doesn't, doesn'tmatter well, and that's
something that we talk about inclient preparation is, we have a
formula and it's called clarityplus trust equals speed, and we
actually say strategic speed,uh, because speed for speed's
(12:00):
sake ends up in the ditch.
And so, um, it's, it's clarityof what matters, who matters to
you, what matters to them andhow they communicate.
So understanding who yourgreatest stakeholders are, and
(12:24):
like deeply understanding notunderstanding, not saying our
customers, but what are yourcustomers value?
Who do they trust to getinformation?
Where do they get informationfrom?
You know, if you're not 40 someyears old, you're likely not on
Facebook.
So if you have a really youngaudience that's not how to be
communicating young audience,that's not how to be
communicating.
(12:44):
And so understanding who theyare, clarity in who, what, where
, all of that and then buildingthe trust with them,
communicating in the placeswhere they need you to
communicate in a way that theyneed you to communicate so
they'll hear you.
That's the insulation forcrisis, because when something
(13:06):
happens, if you've taken thattime to build the trust, get to
know them, they'll give you thebenefit of the doubt.
Yeah, so clarity on that trustin the people, the procedures
and the policies.
Everybody knows what they'redoing, they know what the the
chain of command is and theyknow what our policy is on.
(13:27):
Back to data breach.
They know what our policy is ondata breach.
And so clarity plus trustequals strategic speed, and
strategic speed comes fromhaving all of those things
answered and ability to goforward fast.
Dr. Leah OH (13:44):
Yeah, exactly when you're not in a state of crisis,
when you are thinking clearlyand have time to workshop, that
Absolutely.
Stephanie Craig (13:52):
And make decisions that can be made ahead
of time.
There's no need.
Let's just be honest.
There are very few people inthis world that like to have
their hair on fire.
Dr. Leah OH (14:03):
I am one of them but I don't recommend it yeah,
yep, so make those decisions.
Yep.
So, stephanie, you just kind ofshared some core principles
with us, as clarity and trustequals strategic speed, and I
love that.
And I'm wondering, with that,are there other core principles
(14:24):
that you believe are essentialto maintaining organizational
stability and resilience,especially during crisis?
And I'm wondering too, if theseprinciples do they hold true if
you have a really high profileindividual and an organization,
or do they change a little bitif it's, you know, if you're
talking about, um, a politicalfigure or a large organization,
(14:50):
um, it depends.
Stephanie Craig (14:52):
I think I would go back to those, those two
things.
The clarity and the trustequals speed, all right, and the
reason that I say that thatthey're not any grand principles
is because you should be, as anorganization and an individual,
driven by your values, and it'snot up to us to tell you what
your values are.
(15:13):
It's up to us to lead youthrough an exercise that makes
sure you know what your valuesare and then have those values
weave their way througheverything that people do.
And from an organizationstandpoint, that means does your
if you have a value of, ofhonesty and transparency, okay?
(15:36):
Are?
Is your pay honest andtransparent?
Is your board honest andtransparent?
Are the is the language ofhonesty and transparency in your
evaluations, in your jobpostings, in your internal
newsletters, in your boardreport?
So it's more an idea of helpingpeople figure out what the
(15:57):
principles are for them than usimparting them, and that
actually for an entireorganization that serves as a
touchstone both in a crisis andalso in trying to spot and
mitigate a crisis, because ifyou see someone acting in a way
or a policy that's contraveningto those values that you know to
(16:17):
be true that you all haveadopted, that friction
inevitably is going to lead tosmoke and likely to fire.
And so when people, when wetalk about resilience and
principles around resiliency,the idea of preparation is
critically important there,because it gives people the
(16:38):
confidence that they know wherethey stand, they know what
values they're standing on, theyknow what to do, and so it's
that confidence that we try toimpart by the preparation.
And I think the other one Iwould probably add is mindset.
There needs.
There are two ways you can lookat this.
(16:59):
You can be a okay, I want toplan for this, I want to invest
in planning for this.
I want to walk through myreally bad days so they aren't
really bad when I get here, or Idon't think anything bad is
ever going to happen to me andI'm going to stick my head in
the sand.
Those people usually are theones that end up on the front
page of every newspaper in theworld Mm-hmm.
(17:21):
And so to me that that actuallythe, actually the this, the way
we employ this with leaders isI was a competitive figure
skater as a kid.
I think every kid in Canada iseither a hockey player or a
figure skater.
Yeah, and soccer is becoming avery, very close like third, I
(17:41):
think.
Um, but one thing that my coachused to oh from.
I was a very young competitive.
I turned competitive at like 10.
Um and so they figured outreally fast though that if I
mentally walked through myroutine, I would be able to
(18:02):
understand.
I had to understand what thewhole thing would look like, and
then I would.
I would be able to understand.
I had to understand what thewhole thing would look like.
And then I would?
I would mentally keep walkingthrough it, keep practicing it
in my mind and then practicingit in, and I have honestly used
that throughout my entire life.
Both of my parents have passedaway, and in almost very close
succession to one another, andbut, oh, thank you, but it's
(18:28):
very interesting in everyone'slike, okay, you're, you're,
you're not as upset as I wouldhave, because it was very close
to them, as I would haveexpected you to be, and it's
because I wasn't surprised byanything.
I mentally walked through and Iand I started to deal with
those emotions prior to havingexperienced them.
(18:49):
I don't recommend having to dothat.
Everybody at some point intheir life will have to do that,
but for me, it it it very muchhelped me get through some
emotions that I knew I wouldhave to deal with in the time,
knew I would have to deal within the time, and that's some.
(19:11):
For some folks, thesereputational organizational
crises are their worstprofessional days and I
guarantee you you will not gothrough your career without
having one.
Yeah, so walking through those,those bad days, and that's what
we do in asking you to prepare.
Okay, what does that bad daylook like?
Where are you going to stumble?
(19:32):
How are you going to workthrough that?
That stumble and that mindsetis critically important to, to
wanting to be aware, and I thinkthat leads that desire to build
a, a resilient organization bylooking at the problem, inspires
(19:58):
confidence, because you have toinvest in in preparation, you
have to invest in theinfrastructure.
You know one of the things thatwe constantly talk about, and I
think I told you earlier youknow we're management
consultants that speakcommunicator, yes, and we
(20:20):
inevitably the organizationsthat have the most challenges,
ones that don't havecommunicators at their
leadership table.
Yep, and because it's a greatthing, naturally what we do.
It is our.
We are the people that lookaround corners, we are the
people that say this is whatcould happen.
(20:42):
It's our natural inclination towork through those bad days.
So for most leaders, I say takea page out of your
communicator's book.
Dr. Leah OH (20:51):
Yes, yes, I love that and there's so much.
So when I did my master's, myPhD, I worked in public
relations and I was in crisiscommunication for a little bit
in a healthcare setting in ourfirst big crisis.
So I kind of I did a lot of thework because I was an academic
studying with a PhD and hadcommunication background.
(21:13):
But so much you don't plan for.
And even like I realized I hadto learn how to control my voice
because I was nervous and I wasrecording these messages I'm
like don't record again.
I could not provoke more fearthrough my shaky voice.
You're right.
And for me, I did not likelooking around the corner.
I'm like I can do this, but itis, you know, the mantra of plan
(21:37):
for the worst, expect the best,and that is really challenging
and that's why I really want toraise up what you and your
colleagues do, because that isnot easy work.
It is not an easy way to goabout life when you're always
essentially looking for the exit, like what's going to happen?
What is this plan, what is next?
(21:58):
So thank you for doing that andfor doing it so well.
Stephanie Craig (22:02):
Well, you know we are.
We are the least fun at parties.
We're usually standing in acorner, but it is.
I think it's.
It's interesting to me.
When I was much younger in mycareer, I couldn't understand
why people didn't love this andwhy it was really why I was
(22:23):
attracted to campaigns, becauseit was fast and it was
energizing and you worked 60days straight, maybe longer.
And now I look back and it'sit's not an average skillset and
it's not an average personality.
To I shouldn't say average,it's not a common yes, yeah and
(22:46):
um, and so I have great respectfor other people that have.
Um, I'm a, I'm a judge.
Uh, I think this is the thirdtime I've been a judge for the
PR week, um, uh, gosh, what arethey called?
The do good awards?
What do we call those anyways?
Um, and to look through thoseentries and see how creative
(23:08):
people are, we are not creative.
That's not our job.
Um, it's our job to make surethat the things calm down and
things can get back to business.
But there's a there there's adeep appreciation for
communicators who don't do whatwe do, who do the good stories,
(23:29):
who do the good storytelling,and these are important mixes
and I think they're nuances thataren't really truly understood
by the C-suite.
Dr. Leah OH (23:39):
Oh, completely agree, Completely agree.
It's like, oh, you're all justcommunication All the same.
Completely agree, completelyagree.
It's like, oh, you're all justcommunication All the same.
So let's think a little bitmore about the role of
communication in crisis, and I'mwondering, in your experience,
if you could walk us through.
What does effectivecommunication look like in
(24:00):
managing a crisis?
Well, and then the second part.
What are some of the strategies, your go-to tactics for
ensuring your messages are clearand calmly delivered under
pressure?
Stephanie Craig (24:15):
Well, these are all things that can be decided
ahead of time and goodcommunication.
Leaders have an entire filefolder that is made of holding
statements and message sets anddraft internal emails and all of
(24:35):
these.
So, yeah, communication needsto be clear, needs to be concise
, needs to be accurate andtruthful, and then it absolutely
you need to be able tounderstand what you can talk
about and what you can't, andthat's, that's an understanding
(24:56):
that you know.
Everybody has a number ofpotential crises that they can
think of.
Every industry has veryspecific industry crises.
So, if you understand yourbusiness and that's something
that I'd say to a lot ofcommunicators make sure you
understand the business of thecompany and you can put together
so many potential scenariosthat you can get approved and
(25:20):
you can get ready to go thatonly need a couple different
details put in there.
Also, make friends with thelawyers, because in a crisis,
lawyers and communicators alwayshave to work together and make
sure that they understand whatyou do and you're you know if,
if the decision is, or if thebest interest is not to
(25:42):
communicate, you're not going tocommunicate.
It's not.
You're not like compelled tocompletely give away the whole
store of information justbecause you have the opportunity
and I think that there's a lotof miscommunication between
silos and organizations.
Yes, Yep, so build thoserelationships.
Build your holding statements,figure out who your spokesperson
.
Yes, Yep, so build thoserelationships.
Build your holding statements,figure out who your spokesperson
(26:05):
is.
Dr. Leah OH (26:05):
Yeah, yeah, I really love that.
Figure out ahead of time whatyou can communicate like what.
What can we share and what dowe?
What is proprietary?
What needs to stay just inhouse?
Stephanie Craig (26:20):
Well, and a good example of that is
ransomware.
So most companies haveransomware insurance.
Yeah, does everybody know whatthat ransomware insurance says?
Yeah, does the ransomwareinsurance prevent you from
talking?
Does it?
Do you have to talk?
Like, what are the parametersaround that?
(26:43):
Those are things you can findout beforehand.
So, and you should, right,right, and you should be
prepared and, like any of yourbig divisions within your
organization, figure out whatyou need to know about them and
what they need to know about you, what you need to know about
(27:03):
them and what they need to knowabout you.
So, building those internalrelationships, yeah, it's.
I think the part that is sointeresting to me about
communications in crisis is,once you get to the point of
communicating, it's notparticularly you know unique.
Yeah, you, you, you figured outwho your stakeholders are, you
figured out the best way tocommunicate with them, you know
(27:27):
that the information you have isright, cause you've built the
internal relationships and thenyou're just ready to communicate
, and I think something that'sthat's really important for
folks is that, and I think it'sboth for us, as communicators,
to understand, as well as ourinternal partners is that the
(27:53):
news media isn't always ournumber one constituency, and so
if you need to make sure thatthe people that matter most to
you are getting the informationfrom you, and figure out how
that's supposed to and don't getme wrong, I have a deep love of
reporters and what they do is,um, it's very important and um,
(28:15):
they're doing it with fewer andfewer resources, and then I
think that's something tounderstand is that you need to.
If you are going to speak to themedia, you need to figure out
who you're dealing with and whatthey're dealing with, and it's
not.
I think so many folks areconditioned to the.
(28:36):
I'm going to hold a pressconference and I'm going to do
this.
That very well may not be yourbest strategy.
Figure out what the and alsoyou have to figure out the
strength of your spokesperson.
A lot of times in a crisis, itshould be your CEO.
Leadership matters, but if thatCEO is terrible and gruff and
(28:59):
you better get a media training,him or her media training
terrible and gruff and youbetter get a media training him
or her media training, yeah, andyou better understand the right
format for them, yes.
And so I think there's, ascommunicators, there's the
things that we are very good at.
Then there are the things thatwe need to work on building
relationships, making the plans,executing the plans.
(29:23):
Those are things that make forgood communications.
Dr. Leah OH (29:26):
Exactly, I always think, especially when a term
comes to crisis, I like to thinkof the work.
It should be like dominoes,like everything is already lined
up and hopefully we can juststare at them and they look
beautiful.
But the day the crisis happens,we hit the one and it's, it's
already set, we're ready.
Stephanie Craig (29:46):
Well, this is what I mean by when we talk
about trust.
You trust that all thosedominoes are in line and that
when, when you flick the firstone, you know what's going to
happen.
There's no, there's no mystery.
What's going to happen, andthat makes for a really bad day,
to be less bad.
Dr. Leah OH (30:05):
Yes, exactly yes, and not worse.
Right, absolutely, that iscertainly happening.
And shorter and not longer?
Yeah, exactly.
So let's think about all ofyour political experience.
So you know that you haveexperience in both American and
your political experience.
So you know that you've hadexperience in both American and
Canadian political landscapesand I'm wondering if you can
(30:26):
share with us some of theselessons you learned, probably
about resiliency andadaptability, that you use or
that maybe you coach otherleaders to use and apply in
their own organizations.
Stephanie Craig (30:38):
Well, for me, it's always been understanding
what you stand for when you area political leader, because
there are going to be lots ofpeople wanting things from you
and you're going to be wantingto serve a lot of different
constituencies, and I thinkpolitical leaders owe it to
themselves, as well as to thepeople that support them, to be
(30:59):
honest and transparent on whothey are and then letting people
make a decision for who theyare.
Um, I'm just, I'm trying tothink through.
Um, there's a.
I keep thinking back to this.
I was very, very young I don'teven I hadn't even officially
(31:19):
graduated from college yet whenI was on a federal election
campaign in Canada.
And there's this woman and Iadmit I've lost track of her.
Her name is Leslie Thompson andshe was the head of
communications for the Ministerof Foreign Affairs in Canada
Very prominent fella.
But unlike the United States,they have to run for election,
(31:42):
so first and foremost, they aremembers of parliament and then
they are certain members ofparliament are elevated to
cabinet, so, just like everybodyelse, mr Axworthy had to run
for reelection, and him being soprominent that our campaign got
a lot of attention, a lot ofmedia, and we were supposed to
(32:05):
have a town hall at a seniorcenter and we got word before
any, about 20 minutes beforeanybody got there, that seven
seniors were showing up, a roomset for 200.
And I don't know what I guessit was ringing or something like
(32:26):
that and I remember and I waslike just a deer in the lights
and Leslie looked at me and shegoes what are we doing today?
And I thought, lady, like in mymind, I thought, lady, are you
on like drugs?
Like what do you mean?
She goes I don lady, are you onlike drugs?
Like what do you mean?
She goes I don't make.
Well, we're having a town hall.
She's like no, we're not, we'rehaving a round table.
(32:50):
And she just, she's like listen, she's like there's a table in
the back of the room that wewere going to use for sign in,
bring that up here, put 10, 12chairs around the table.
Yeah, we're having a roundtable, love it.
And it was that, that moment ofof yeah.
(33:14):
Just leadership, that she had tosave this, and I've never,
obviously, all these years later, I've never forgotten it, never
forgotten her name, and it justit was a moment for me of okay,
there's, there's no defeat inthis.
You have to figure out how tomake it work.
And I think that campaign wasjust so absolutely impactful for
me, because I remember so manyother issues as um, I'd gotten
(33:36):
to do, uh, prime minister'sadvance, so an advanced team for
the leader.
And it was my first, my firstevent yeah and I got to staff,
um, the first lady and herdaughter and I was 21 years old
and super green and the her,their daughter grabbed me by the
arm.
She said you want to be ajournalist, let's get out there.
(33:57):
And so we went out, went outand I I was watching the scrum
with the prime minister as primeminister, and I can't I cannot
remember this man's name, butthey didn't have kind of like a
little podium for him to standup, like not much, I think it
was.
He would have needed like afoot or two, but the media were
(34:18):
just pressing, pressing,pressing in, and so it would
have looked very, you know, kindof almost like interrogatory,
right yeah, and his head ofadvance pushed his way to the
front and about three feet backfrom the prime minister, he sat
(34:39):
down on the floor.
This man in this like $500 suitjust sat down cross-legged in
front of the prime minister andthey and it pushed the media
back.
And these like these lessonsfrom these just pros, and that's
the adaptability that I thinkfolks need.
You need to be able tounderstand the situation and
(35:01):
what you need out of it andfigure out what to do to make it
happen.
I've never forgotten thoselessons.
Uh, I one of the things that Ilove to do is I love to be a
mentor and um and a support forfolks coming up in the industry,
and those are the things that Itell people you've got to go do
(35:22):
volunteer.
You've got to go do things thatscare you, that are that are
frenetic, that go figure out howto adapt to all these things
and it's it's a lot of fun andso many good skills.
Dr. Leah OH (35:38):
Yeah, yeah, that is so incredible and I think that
shows you the power ofcommunications.
I think a lot of people thinkit's just my verbals.
You're like, nope, that was avery clear nonverbal when that
gentleman sat down, literallytook up that space to be like,
yeah, we're stopping here and Ilove to in that story, of being
(35:59):
like we're having a round table,even the sass to like people
say, what are we doing today,like to play a little bit with
it, and you recognize that whenyou are leaning into these
adaptability muscles and theseresilience muscles, a lot of
confidence I think stems fromthat competence.
(36:19):
Yes, and that is really reallyincredible.
Stephanie Craig (36:25):
Well, it gives you experience, and that's if
anyone has any political inkling.
Even if you don't make a careerout of it, I highly recommend
working on a campaign.
The people are deeplyentertaining.
You also really learn how tomake do with very little, and to
(36:46):
be able to be exposed to thatwhen you're young is important.
And given that communication isso dramatically important to
politics, you really don't finda lot of better communicators
than those that come out ofpolitics, and so go figure out
how they do what they do.
And I think another interestingangle for communicators in
(37:08):
politics is communicators are sowell respected.
It's such an important functionin a political office.
Go figure out what that feelslike.
Go learn from people that knowwhat that feels like.
Dr. Leah OH (37:22):
Yes, I love that.
So really closely related toyour work in politics, but
beyond that as well, let's thinkabout reputation.
So you know that reputation isoften at stake, especially
during a crisis, and I'mwondering what are some kind of
proactive steps that leaders cancan take ahead of time to
(37:46):
safeguard their reputation ortheir organization's reputation?
So when a crisis hits, you knowmaybe that that hit isn't quite
so so deep.
Stephanie Craig (37:58):
Do all the things that I've already talked
about.
There is there are no crises inan organization that don't have
a reputational impact, andsomething that a lot of business
leaders don't understand isthat brand is what you own.
Your reputation is what peoplesay about you.
(38:20):
It's what your stakeholders own.
I like that, and so, as youthink about how you safeguard
your reputation which, let'sjust be honest, leah is now
about 35% of your organizationalvalue, wow, like, think about
that, yeah.
Something intangible anddelicate, is 35% of your
(38:43):
organization's value.
Some people it's even higher,someone's probably a little
lower, but it's valuable.
And so, as people think aboutwhat they need to do for a
reputation, it's understandingthose stakeholders, it's
building that trust with yourstakeholders.
So, when the time comes,because they're the people that
hold your reputation yeah, oneof the most interesting recent
(39:09):
examples of that do you remembermaybe, like six months ago,
there was a little kerfuffleabout a five guys receipts going
around social media.
Oh, mm-hmm.
Because like a hamburger and itwas like $23.
Yes, five guys said nothing.
Do you remember this?
They said absolutely nothing.
It's because they knew theircustomers.
(39:33):
They know how much they'repaying.
It wasn't a surprise to them,but they still keep coming back.
Yeah, and so that understandingof your reputation is really
important and there's a there'sa lot of recent examples of not
(39:55):
understanding who your audienceis, and I think there's some
very complicated ones.
Folks talk a lot about the BudLight issue.
I think that's some verycomplicated ones.
Folks talk a lot about the BudLight issue.
I think that one's verycomplicated because you do have
a lot of differentconstituencies and in a lot of
cases, those constituencies arevery counter to each other.
So that one's very, very, verycomplicated.
(40:17):
And do I think they handled itright?
Not really, but that's becausethey didn't put the effort in to
understand what was going on.
But it's a complicated one.
But you know there's some otherreally good ones Costco.
There was recently a big foodrecall.
Dr. Leah OH (40:37):
Okay.
Stephanie Craig (40:38):
And Costco knew everyone that bought it and
they called them.
Dr. Leah OH (40:41):
Oh, that's incredible, Right, yeah, that's
values Yep, that's constituency.
Stephanie Craig (40:50):
And then those people talk to other people and
so, and then they give them thebenefit of the doubt.
They knew that Costco wouldprobably do something important
like that, yes, yeah, wouldprobably do something important
like that, yes.
And so all of these things thatwe talk about building this
infrastructure to is reputation,resiliency.
Yeah.
(41:10):
And your reputation, and Ithink that if folks take
anything away from what I saidtoday is reputation is not owned
by you.
It is owned by yourstakeholders.
Dr. Leah OH (41:20):
Yeah, yeah, I love that, I love that.
I've never thought about itthat way and you said that like
a light bulb moment, total sense.
But yeah, I think you're right,until someone kind of points
that out.
It's like ah, yes.
Stephanie Craig (41:37):
Absolutely.
Dr. Leah OH (41:39):
So let's continue this idea of kind of getting
ready and crisis proofing asmuch as we can and thinking
about this at the team level inorganizations.
So I'm wondering if you couldshare some insights on how
leaders can cultivate thisculture within their teams,
where they are inherentlyresilient and prepared to face,
(42:03):
you know, any unexpectedchallenge.
Stephanie Craig (42:06):
The two big things would be that has to come
from the top down, they have tofund it, they have to
prioritize it, and I would.
The actionable item is create acore crisis team.
A core crisis team andeverybody on that team has to
have one of two skills the bestteam members have two, that they
(42:33):
have to have a subject matterknowledge and they have to
ability to make decisions.
I've I've never put together acrisis, a core crisis team, that
didn't have a communicator, thehead communicator, the lawyer,
and probably HR, I would say, orit, depending on what kind of
company it is.
(42:53):
So, but definitely thecommunicator and the lawyer, and
it shouldn't be more than eightto 10 people.
Yeah.
And your company culturedictates.
If the CEO or leaders in theteam because sometimes we worked
with a college that had theirpresident was an 800 pound
gorilla, yeah, and if she werein the room, the, the, the team
(43:18):
would, their goal was to pleaseher, not good, the team would.
Their goal was to please her,not good.
And so we worked out a waywhere the team came up with two
recommendations and then therewere two people designated to go
present them to her and shecould decide what they were.
But they got to deliberate,they got to have their best
expert recommendation, that,that thumb on the scale, Um, and
(43:42):
the leadership is alsocritically important.
We did a uh uh simulation witha, a global company, and the CEO
of the company.
They were, they're like in 17countries.
Okay.
Was the first person there everyday.
Hmm, and then?
(44:03):
you kind of figure.
I think he really knew his teambecause oh wait, he would get
there a little bit earlier andeveryone would try to beat him
and what he needed to do, butthat was because he prioritized
it.
He really understood whatneeded to happen.
And that sort of leadership isinvaluable and it also people on
(44:26):
it gives people the confidencethat you take the resiliency of
your company, the resiliency ofyour reputation, seriously when
you invest in protecting it, andthat's a vote of confidence for
the company.
You invest in protecting it andthat's a vote of confidence for
the company.
And people like comfort.
Oh yeah, they like to know thatsomebody is caring what's
(44:48):
happening, that they'reinvesting in helping people
figure out what they need to doto row the boat with them.
Those kind of investments arereally important for a multitude
of reasons.
Dr. Leah OH (45:01):
Yeah, and I think too, I love that you bring so
much of leader values andorganizational values and help
people identify those if theyhaven't quite spelled them out,
because with time, when you'reliving those values, then you
have better retention, right?
Because you have the folks whoself-identify and then the
(45:21):
people are like this doesn'tquite align with mine, that's
fine.
Have the folks whoself-identify and then the
people are like, eh, thisdoesn't quite align with mine,
that's fine, then they canself-select out.
But we're seeing too and you'retalking about building these
teams that are inherentlyresilient, and the modeling, how
it shows up that way as well.
I really love that.
All right.
Let's talk about blind spotslike these vulnerabilities.
(45:43):
So, in your experience, whatare some common vulnerabilities
that are often overlooked Eitherleaders overlook these or
organizations and what are someof your tips for kind of maybe
spotting these before it's toolate?
Stephanie Craig (46:04):
it's too late.
Well, the biggest one we see isis absolutely, is the head in
the sand.
It never going to happen to me.
Um, we have a couple ofdifferent tools that you're that
we have that give folks, um,empirical information to take
leaders to try and shake themout.
Um, that is, uh, what's theword I'm looking for?
Um, that's really the biggestblind spot that we see.
(46:27):
Uh, and then it's other leadersthat are are.
Well, you know, this doesn'taffect me, and those they they
tend to require very, uh,analytical approaches to be able
to to deal with them.
So, for instance, I spoke at aconference this past fall and we
talked about the ramificationson your financial infrastructure
(46:52):
of a reputational crisis.
If your reputation is damaged,your customers go away.
Your supply chain may not wantto do business with you.
So those are both economicshortfalls.
If it's something that requiresinsurance, do you have enough
(47:13):
reserves to be able to coverwhat in between when the
incident happens and when theinsurance pays out, Do you have
enough reserves?
And when you start talking topeople about it that way, they
light bulbs really start to gooff of.
Oh wait, this isn't just to.
I'm going to show my age hereand quote bridget jones um, this
(47:35):
isn't just somebody fanningaround with a press release.
Yeah, they're real businessramifications.
Yeah, and when peopleunderstand that that, I think
one of the reasons that, um, Idon't do a lot of speaking to
communicators is because, by andlarge, communicators get it,
Are my.
(47:55):
You know, evangelism comes intothe other parts of the business
.
The CEO, the CFO, the chieflegal counsel those are the
folks that I want to talk to tomake sure that that they talk to
their communicator, at the veryleast go and, you know, meet
them and figure out what they're, what's keeping them up at
night.
Um yeah, and respect thefunction.
(48:18):
I think is another anotherthing I'd love to yell about
yeah, yeah, yeah, I think you'reright thing.
Dr. Leah OH (48:21):
I'd love to yell about yeah, yeah, yeah.
I think you're right in helpingpeople to recognize that, even
if you think this isn't going toimpact you, this is
interdependent.
Absolutely this organization isnot thriving, you personally
and your team will not bethriving.
Stephanie Craig (48:39):
Yes, well, a good example of that I actually
wrote about this was the SiliconValley Bank.
Okay, I I did not talk aboutthe, you know, financial side of
it.
I am not a CFO, I'm not, don'twork for the SEC.
But one thing that wascritically missing in that whole
situation is they didn't have asenior communications person in
(49:00):
the bank.
Hands down period didn't, and alarge part of what drove their
problem was the way the CEO wascommunicating.
And if there had been acommunications person sitting in
that room saying you can't sayeverything's going to be OK
(49:22):
because people automaticallyassume that it's not right now,
yeah, and those kinds of blindspots on on who can contribute
and who can help you mitigateand spot, I think are are fatal
sometimes.
Dr. Leah OH (49:42):
Mm.
Hmm, yeah, yeah, I agree, Ithink are are fatal sometimes.
Yeah, yeah, I, I agree.
And great example to bring upwatching that one play out was
was pretty painful, absolutelyyeah.
So let's shift gears a littlebit and think about advocacy and
social movements and I knowyou've been involved in a lot of
efforts this way, like I am,als and the force to end
(50:06):
harassment and advocacy, andStephanie is hoping you could
share kind of how socialmovements influence your
approach to crisis managementand reputation repair.
Stephanie Craig (50:18):
Well, it's.
This all comes back to valuesand living your values, and
there are all sorts of valuesacross the spectrum in
organizations.
You know, if you are anadvocacy organization, you wear
your values in your name.
If you were a business, youeither don't have a perspective
(50:38):
or you do have a perspective.
So you know Hobby Lobby,everybody knows kind of what
Hobby Lobby stands for, and sothey understand also how they
are going to react to socialmovements.
And this again is comes back toknowing who your constituents
are.
Ben and Jerry's before theywere sold same kind of thing
(50:58):
understood who theirconstituents were and so they
lived their values in theircompany.
So they, you know, theyunderstood kind of the landscape
for companies that don't theyhave to go back to those.
They have to do the valuesexercise, they have to do the
stakeholder exercise, becausethat gives you clarity in if,
(51:21):
how and when you will engage ina social movement.
And another thing that I wouldhighly recommend if you are a,
an organization that doesbusiness in the United States,
can you be part of a tradeassociation?
(51:43):
Do you need governmentrelations?
Because, given the highlyinterconnected communications in
this world, if somebody takesissue with what you're doing and
you don't have an understandingof the landscape and you don't
understand what you stand for.
You are going to be a floatingin the middle of an ocean.
(52:05):
Yeah.
You need that touchstone forwhen an issue comes knocking.
One of the you know guidanceswe sent out to CEOs after a year
, after January 6th, was youknow, did you make promises last
year?
Where are they?
(52:27):
Yeah, and we are.
We are very um.
We make it a habit to not workon day-to-day politics in our
firm.
All of us come out of politicsbut we don't work in politics.
Um, because we understand thatthere are different approaches
and um.
It makes us better to work withpeople.
(52:48):
We don't always agree with Um,and so it becomes a really good
exercise for us to help Pete,for us to help people work
through, but we want people towork through them, because if
you do not have again, if you donot have that touchstone when
somebody comes knocking, you'renot going to know what to do.
(53:10):
And the other part of it is tomake sure it's congruent
throughout your organization.
Yeah, if you say you believe X,it better be throughout the
entire organization.
Leave X, it better bethroughout the entire
organization.
Yeah, and a lot of folks haveum, a lot of people that do
(53:32):
political giving, a lot of thebigger companies that do giving.
They're very much um, they'redone for strategic reasons.
But understanding how thosestrategic reasons tie into your
reputation and to the peoplethat you value yeah is important
because nothing lives in an onan island anymore yeah
(53:55):
yeah, and for me personally,getting involved in helping
start imals, als and, uh, endingadvocacy, ending harassment and
advocacy were two very personalissues for me, um, and so I
think that, um, I, as an example, um, very tragically, uh, the
(54:18):
actor Eric Dane was diagnosedwith ALS the other week.
The actor Eric Dane wasdiagnosed with ALS the other
week and, despite the fact thatPeople Magazine has had the
founders of I Am ALS on thecover, the reporter went to the
Muscular Dystrophy Associationto quote about ALS and they got
(54:39):
a whole bunch of things wrongand that is a perfect example.
I deeply care about this.
And now my impression of PeopleMagazine is completely off base,
yeah, and so I think thatthat's to me, understanding
those values is very, veryimportant yeah.
Dr. Leah OH (55:01):
Exactly and understanding those values is
very, very important.
Yeah, exactly, and I like to,because I think so many
organizations and I do thinkthis is shifting now with the
political landscape but so manyare like it was just this little
bit of a homework assignment.
Here's our mission statement,here's our vision statement,
Done and they leave it.
Stephanie Craig (55:19):
But I love that idea of actually living it and
being able to speak to itbecause you're embodying it Well
, and something that you saidjust really struck me, which is
if people don't buy into it,they can just move on.
Dr. Leah OH (55:35):
Exactly yeah.
Stephanie Craig (55:37):
If they don't like what you're selling.
Dr. Leah OH (55:39):
Yeah, yep, just move on.
It's not good for them and it'snot good for you, and we know
what to do then, right,absolutely, absolutely, yeah.
So, stephanie, last twoquestions for you, and they're
intertwined, and this is the waythat we end all episodes of the
communicative leader is, youknow, advice or a challenge or a
(56:01):
tip for our titled leaders outthere?
And then the second part isagain what is the pragmatic
leadership or communication tip,advice or challenge for
employees of all ranks andacross all industries?
Stephanie Craig (56:14):
Well for those in the role.
Don't forget that you arevitally important to business.
Mm-hmm.
Don't forget that you arevitally important to business.
There is nobody moves along, noone can sell anything if they
have communications and the thethe end to that is
(56:37):
communications and marketing arenot the same thing and if, if I
had my way, marketing wouldalways report to communications.
Yeah, I love it and I'm sorry,leah, I was thinking about that.
What was the second?
Dr. Leah OH (56:48):
question.
Well, and the second one isjust for all employees.
So we have some folks.
I think, especially after COVID, a lot of folks are like I
don't want the stress with thetitled position, but
self-leadership and growing aspeople.
So those folks who are not in atitle leadership position, but
self-leadership and you know,growing as people.
So those folks who are not in atitle leadership position, you
know any different rank.
What advice, challenge or tipdo you want to leave them with?
Stephanie Craig (57:13):
It never hurts to make friends outside your
circle, and that helps you as aprofessional, that helps you as
a person and it helps yourorganization, Because learning
about what other people do andcreating those relationships
like I said, I'm a collector ofpeople- yes.
Because I love people, I findthem fascinating, I find them
(57:34):
interesting, and just go meetother people in your
organizations because it willmake your experience better and
it will make your industrybetter.
Dr. Leah OH (57:48):
Yes, yes, I love that and it's something.
You're right that for many ofus, it's not the natural
inclination but it's a gamechanger, and a really important
one, absolutely.
Stephanie.
Thank you for sharing yourexpertise with us, your time.
I've learned so much in thisinterview.
I've really enjoyed ourconversation and I learned so
much in this interview.
I've really enjoyed ourconversation and I know our
listeners will as well.
Stephanie Craig (58:05):
Leah, it's been my absolute pleasure, and
anytime you want to chat again,I would love to do it.
Dr. Leah OH (58:12):
All right, my friends.
That wraps up our conversationtoday.
Until next time, communicatewith intention and lead with
purpose.
I'm looking forward to chattingwith you again soon on the
communicative leader.
Welcome to another insightful episode of the
Communicative Leader.
I'm your host, dr Leah oh, andtoday we're thrilled to
introduce you to Stephanie Craig, a renowned crisis expert who
has guided world leaders and toporganizations through their
most challenging moments.
As the president of KithConsulting, stephanie brings a
wealth of experience from therealms of politics, media and
(00:23):
business to the art of crisismanagement and organizational
resilience.
Stephanie's unique blend ofstrategic communication and
reputation management has helpedher build a stellar reputation
as she mitigates crises, repairsreputations and fortifies
organizations against futurechallenges.
(00:43):
Her impressive career includesworking with distinguished
figures like former First LadyRosalyn Carter and influential
Fortune 500 companies, offeringher unparalleled insights into
the dynamics of very high-stakessituations.
In today's episode, we're goingto delve into crucial topics
such as the core principles ofcrisis management, the role of
(01:07):
communication during turbulenttimes and how leaders can build
resilient crisis-ready teams.
Stephanie shares her strategiesfor safeguarding your
organization's reputation andovercoming vulnerabilities that
a lot of times we tend tooverlook, vulnerabilities that a
lot of times we tend tooverlook.
(01:27):
So, if you are eager to learnhow to steer your organization
through these stormy seas andemerge even stronger, this
episode is packed with expertadvice and practical strategies
to enhance your crisis readinessand solidify your leadership
effectiveness.
Let's have some fun.
Hello and welcome to theCommunicative Leader hosted by
me, dr Leah Omilion- Hodges.
(01:49):
My friends call me Dr O.
I'm a professor ofcommunication and a leadership
communication expert.
On the Communicative Leader,we're working to make your work
life what you want it to be.
Welcome, stephanie.
I'm so excited to have you onthe Communicative Leader and
(02:10):
before we begin our conversation, I was hoping you could share a
little bit about your journey.
So you've been in politics,media and business.
You're a crisis expert andpresident of Kith Consulting, so
just give us a little bit ofthat pathway.
Stephanie Craig (02:25):
Well, leah, thank you so much for having me.
I'm really thrilled to be here.
I think the whole story of howI got here starts a long time
ago, and I can literally say aland far away.
I was born in the CanadianArctic.
My father was a Royal CanadianMounted Police Officer you know
(02:45):
those guys with the hats and thered jackets, and so you know I,
my mom, used to say that I'vebeen through every natural
disaster except a tsunami, and Idefinitely choose not to cross
that one off the list.
Yeah, don't want that one, butalso it's.
I come from a line of of peoplethat find common chaos.
(03:08):
Um, my grandfather was in worldwar II at Normandy.
My dad, as I mentioned, was aRoyal Canadian Mounted Police
officer who specialized in umhostage negotiation.
Lovely thing to emulate.
Really not appreciating as ateenager.
Um, lovely thing to emulatereally not appreciating as a
teenager, but really.
(03:32):
I always, even as a kid, found acalming sense of being in the
middle of chaos Excuse me, leahand I graduated from college in
the middle of a 500-year flood.
Oh, it was literally thelargest up until Hurricane
Katrina.
It was the largest evacuationin the US since the Civil War,
and so, you know, just reallyfound myself in a calm spot,
(03:57):
being able to just help folksand do what we needed to do, and
that just led me into a careerin politics, which helped me
refine this, this real, umdesire to, to take control, and
I I freely admit that I am acontrol freak and that it has
served me well.
Um, and so, being in in inpolitics it's.
(04:20):
It really helped me learn frompeople that knew how to adapt
and in in crisis.
That is something that we try toimpart upon our clients is,
when they're in a crisis, teachthem how to adapt.
Our preferred way of workingwith people honestly is to teach
(04:40):
them how to mitigate a crisis,how to spot a crisis and how to
recover from one faster.
So being able to teach folkshow to adapt and how to
structure themselves in a waythat makes all of those things
easier something I learnedthrough politics a real hard
(05:09):
work ethic that I have loved andhave taken with me everywhere
and have through.
First my first part of my life,I got to see almost all of
Canada, and then my politicallife has taken me across the
United States to so many neatand wonderful places, and each
time I've learned a little bitmore about a region.
I've learned a little bit moreabout industry, which crisis
management itself is agnostic,but it's really helpful to be
(05:30):
that old adage an inch deep anda mile wide.
Mm, hmm.
Dr. Leah OH (05:35):
Yeah, yeah.
That is a fascinating story,stephanie, and it makes sense
and, I'm sure, positions youperfectly to be a guide during
crisis and before, and thecoaching and afterwards.
Stephanie Craig (05:51):
Absolutely.
I think that's something thatfolks expect you not to be able
to.
Well, I'm special.
We might have a data breach.
Well, unless you're a databreach expert and you have one,
no one's going to be an expertin data breach.
Well, unless you're a databreach expert and you have one,
no one's going to be an expertin data breach.
So part of the nice thing aboutthe way I've built my career
and my life, I love people.
(06:11):
I find people fascinating and Ilike to collect them, and so in
my world I have a few peoplethat are data breach experts.
So I don't have to be a databreach expert, I just have to
know one Exactly.
Dr. Leah OH (06:23):
Yes, exactly, that's a.
It reminds me my spouse is likeI don't need to know what our
calendar is, you know what it isright.
Like when you have thoseconnections, it really can make
you really yeah.
So let's think about some highstakes leadership and I know,
stephanie, you have guided manyprominent figures and
organizations through reallychallenging situations and I was
(06:46):
hoping you could share one ofthese high stakes situations
that really impacted orotherwise shaped your personal
approach to crisis management.
Stephanie Craig (06:58):
It's actually it's not been one particular
issue.
As I mentioned, there was theflood, and then there's been
some other very high stakesissues that we've encountered,
and some that stick more with meare the ones that impact people
, and it's something that is notvery I guess the word I'm
(07:20):
looking for is folks don't thinkthat these people exist anymore
, but I've made it a big, bigpriority to work for people in
politics that I believed in, andone instance in particular and
it was a long, long crisissituation was I was an advisor
to the mayor of San Jose,california, during COVID and we
(07:44):
were charged with you know howare we going to take?
Because San Jose is consideredbasically the capital of Silicon
Valley and it was so highhomelessness population.
You know housing is expensiveand you know we really knew two
things we had to serve people.
We really knew two things wehad to serve people and we had
(08:09):
the talent in our own backyardto be innovative and so that
kind of those kinds of crisissituations, while long-term and
that's something people don'treally grasp Leah is that crisis
.
There are some crises that arecontained and you can be like
done, I'm moving on, and othersare a very long tail and that's
(08:33):
why I choose this one to talkabout.
There are some there are somevery sexy ones where you know we
were on the front page of everynewspaper in the world.
Uh, and that's honestly whensomebody called us too late.
If you call us beforehand, wecan do everything we can to keep
you off the campaign.
Exactly that's that's when it'stoo late.
(08:54):
You know you call us, you knowwe can help, but we prefer to
help earlier.
But the reason I talk about thatone is there were the the.
The kind of adage in in SiliconValley is they kind of got the
idea that COVID was coming alittle bit earlier than other
folks, okay, and so they startedreally planning and figuring
(09:17):
out.
It ended up with something veryrevolutionary.
It was called the SiliconValley recovery council and it
had some of the most prominentnames in tech gathering to
create a plan to support thecommunity, and that, to me, is a
really good example of you knowwhat you need to do, you figure
out what resources you need tomake an impact and then you go
(09:41):
to work and then you go to work.
Dr. Leah OH (09:47):
Yeah, and I mean and think about all of the
leadership at every level therein planning ahead of time and
making sure the right people areat the table.
And I love, too, that youstarted that by talking about
how do we serve those around us.
What a profound example, whatan incredible thing to be a part
of.
Stephanie Craig (10:02):
I mean, no one was excited about COVID,
especially when there were somany unknowns, but to be able to
be in a position to help lessenit and make it better for your
community really really powerfulthing about that that was
(10:27):
interesting is that the rightcommunicating to so many
different groups of peoplebusiness leaders, community
leaders, average citizens,business, you know, business
folks that were worrying aboutthe survivability of their own
business it required a lot ofnuanced communicating and
understanding what not changingwhat we said, but changing how
the message was delivered.
So very specific groups wouldhear what we had to say, and Sam
(10:51):
does.
The mayor who's now in Congressand one of my favorite people,
um, he was.
He's a very plain spoken personand getting those nuances is
important and he was very goodat it and it made our job a lot
easier because he understoodfrequency, he understood tone,
(11:12):
he understood audience and whenyou are trying to make people
understand that you know whatwe're doing everything we can
and we have hope that this isgoing to work.
I think it's communication isjust critical.
Dr. Leah OH (11:27):
Yeah, yeah.
And, like you said too, I thinkso many people think well, I've
posted it or I hit send, sothey're done.
Stephanie Craig (11:36):
Communication has occurred, but if people, if
the message isn't framed in away where people are going to
listen to it, doesn't, doesn'tmatter well, and that's
something that we talk about inclient preparation is, we have a
formula and it's called clarityplus trust equals speed, and we
actually say strategic speed,uh, because speed for speed's
(12:00):
sake ends up in the ditch.
And so, um, it's, it's clarityof what matters, who matters to
you, what matters to them andhow they communicate.
So understanding who yourgreatest stakeholders are, and
(12:24):
like deeply understanding notunderstanding, not saying our
customers, but what are yourcustomers value?
Who do they trust to getinformation?
Where do they get informationfrom?
You know, if you're not 40 someyears old, you're likely not on
Facebook.
So if you have a really youngaudience that's not how to be
communicating young audience,that's not how to be
communicating.
(12:44):
And so understanding who theyare, clarity in who, what, where
, all of that and then buildingthe trust with them,
communicating in the placeswhere they need you to
communicate in a way that theyneed you to communicate so
they'll hear you.
That's the insulation forcrisis, because when something
(13:06):
happens, if you've taken thattime to build the trust, get to
know them, they'll give you thebenefit of the doubt.
Yeah, so clarity on that trustin the people, the procedures
and the policies.
Everybody knows what they'redoing, they know what the the
chain of command is and theyknow what our policy is on.
(13:27):
Back to data breach.
They know what our policy is ondata breach.
And so clarity plus trustequals strategic speed, and
strategic speed comes fromhaving all of those things
answered and ability to goforward fast.
Dr. Leah OH (13:44):
Yeah, exactly when you're not in a state of crisis,
when you are thinking clearlyand have time to workshop, that
Absolutely.
Stephanie Craig (13:52):
And make decisions that can be made ahead
of time.
There's no need.
Let's just be honest.
There are very few people inthis world that like to have
their hair on fire.
Dr. Leah OH (14:03):
I am one of them but I don't recommend it yeah,
yep, so make those decisions.
Yep.
So, stephanie, you just kind ofshared some core principles
with us, as clarity and trustequals strategic speed, and I
love that.
And I'm wondering, with that,are there other core principles
(14:24):
that you believe are essentialto maintaining organizational
stability and resilience,especially during crisis?
And I'm wondering too, if theseprinciples do they hold true if
you have a really high profileindividual and an organization,
or do they change a little bitif it's, you know, if you're
talking about, um, a politicalfigure or a large organization,
(14:50):
um, it depends.
Stephanie Craig (14:52):
I think I would go back to those, those two
things.
The clarity and the trustequals speed, all right, and the
reason that I say that thatthey're not any grand principles
is because you should be, as anorganization and an individual,
driven by your values, and it'snot up to us to tell you what
your values are.
(15:13):
It's up to us to lead youthrough an exercise that makes
sure you know what your valuesare and then have those values
weave their way througheverything that people do.
And from an organizationstandpoint, that means does your
if you have a value of, ofhonesty and transparency, okay?
(15:36):
Are?
Is your pay honest andtransparent?
Is your board honest andtransparent?
Are the is the language ofhonesty and transparency in your
evaluations, in your jobpostings, in your internal
newsletters, in your boardreport?
So it's more an idea of helpingpeople figure out what the
(15:57):
principles are for them than usimparting them, and that
actually for an entireorganization that serves as a
touchstone both in a crisis andalso in trying to spot and
mitigate a crisis, because ifyou see someone acting in a way
or a policy that's contraveningto those values that you know to
(16:17):
be true that you all haveadopted, that friction
inevitably is going to lead tosmoke and likely to fire.
And so when people, when wetalk about resilience and
principles around resiliency,the idea of preparation is
critically important there,because it gives people the
(16:38):
confidence that they know wherethey stand, they know what
values they're standing on, theyknow what to do, and so it's
that confidence that we try toimpart by the preparation.
And I think the other one Iwould probably add is mindset.
There needs.
There are two ways you can lookat this.
(16:59):
You can be a okay, I want toplan for this, I want to invest
in planning for this.
I want to walk through myreally bad days so they aren't
really bad when I get here, or Idon't think anything bad is
ever going to happen to me andI'm going to stick my head in
the sand.
Those people usually are theones that end up on the front
page of every newspaper in theworld Mm-hmm.
(17:21):
And so to me that that actuallythe, actually the this, the way
we employ this with leaders isI was a competitive figure
skater as a kid.
I think every kid in Canada iseither a hockey player or a
figure skater.
Yeah, and soccer is becoming avery, very close like third, I
(17:41):
think.
Um, but one thing that my coachused to oh from.
I was a very young competitive.
I turned competitive at like 10.
Um and so they figured outreally fast though that if I
mentally walked through myroutine, I would be able to
(18:02):
understand.
I had to understand what thewhole thing would look like, and
then I would.
I would be able to understand.
I had to understand what thewhole thing would look like.
And then I would?
I would mentally keep walkingthrough it, keep practicing it
in my mind and then practicingit in, and I have honestly used
that throughout my entire life.
Both of my parents have passedaway, and in almost very close
succession to one another, andbut, oh, thank you, but it's
(18:28):
very interesting in everyone'slike, okay, you're, you're,
you're not as upset as I wouldhave, because it was very close
to them, as I would haveexpected you to be, and it's
because I wasn't surprised byanything.
I mentally walked through and Iand I started to deal with
those emotions prior to havingexperienced them.
(18:49):
I don't recommend having to dothat.
Everybody at some point intheir life will have to do that,
but for me, it it it very muchhelped me get through some
emotions that I knew I wouldhave to deal with in the time,
knew I would have to deal within the time, and that's some.
(19:11):
For some folks, thesereputational organizational
crises are their worstprofessional days and I
guarantee you you will not gothrough your career without
having one.
Yeah, so walking through those,those bad days, and that's what
we do in asking you to prepare.
Okay, what does that bad daylook like?
Where are you going to stumble?
(19:32):
How are you going to workthrough that?
That stumble and that mindsetis critically important to, to
wanting to be aware, and I thinkthat leads that desire to build
a, a resilient organization bylooking at the problem, inspires
(19:58):
confidence, because you have toinvest in in preparation, you
have to invest in theinfrastructure.
You know one of the things thatwe constantly talk about, and I
think I told you earlier youknow we're management
consultants that speakcommunicator, yes, and we
(20:20):
inevitably the organizationsthat have the most challenges,
ones that don't havecommunicators at their
leadership table.
Yep, and because it's a greatthing, naturally what we do.
It is our.
We are the people that lookaround corners, we are the
people that say this is whatcould happen.
(20:42):
It's our natural inclination towork through those bad days.
So for most leaders, I say takea page out of your
communicator's book.
Dr. Leah OH (20:51):
Yes, yes, I love that and there's so much.
So when I did my master's, myPhD, I worked in public
relations and I was in crisiscommunication for a little bit
in a healthcare setting in ourfirst big crisis.
So I kind of I did a lot of thework because I was an academic
studying with a PhD and hadcommunication background.
(21:13):
But so much you don't plan for.
And even like I realized I hadto learn how to control my voice
because I was nervous and I wasrecording these messages I'm
like don't record again.
I could not provoke more fearthrough my shaky voice.
You're right.
And for me, I did not likelooking around the corner.
I'm like I can do this, but itis, you know, the mantra of plan
(21:37):
for the worst, expect the best,and that is really challenging
and that's why I really want toraise up what you and your
colleagues do, because that isnot easy work.
It is not an easy way to goabout life when you're always
essentially looking for the exit, like what's going to happen?
What is this plan, what is next?
(21:58):
So thank you for doing that andfor doing it so well.
Stephanie Craig (22:02):
Well, you know we are.
We are the least fun at parties.
We're usually standing in acorner, but it is.
I think it's.
It's interesting to me.
When I was much younger in mycareer, I couldn't understand
why people didn't love this andwhy it was really why I was
(22:23):
attracted to campaigns, becauseit was fast and it was
energizing and you worked 60days straight, maybe longer.
And now I look back and it'sit's not an average skillset and
it's not an average personality.
To I shouldn't say average,it's not a common yes, yeah and
(22:46):
um, and so I have great respectfor other people that have.
Um, I'm a, I'm a judge.
Uh, I think this is the thirdtime I've been a judge for the
PR week, um, uh, gosh, what arethey called?
The do good awards?
What do we call those anyways?
Um, and to look through thoseentries and see how creative
(23:08):
people are, we are not creative.
That's not our job.
Um, it's our job to make surethat the things calm down and
things can get back to business.
But there's a there there's adeep appreciation for
communicators who don't do whatwe do, who do the good stories,
(23:29):
who do the good storytelling,and these are important mixes
and I think they're nuances thataren't really truly understood
by the C-suite.
Dr. Leah OH (23:39):
Oh, completely agree, Completely agree.
It's like, oh, you're all justcommunication All the same.
Completely agree, completelyagree.
It's like, oh, you're all justcommunication All the same.
So let's think a little bitmore about the role of
communication in crisis, and I'mwondering, in your experience,
if you could walk us through.
What does effectivecommunication look like in
(24:00):
managing a crisis?
Well, and then the second part.
What are some of the strategies, your go-to tactics for
ensuring your messages are clearand calmly delivered under
pressure?
Stephanie Craig (24:15):
Well, these are all things that can be decided
ahead of time and goodcommunication.
Leaders have an entire filefolder that is made of holding
statements and message sets anddraft internal emails and all of
(24:35):
these.
So, yeah, communication needsto be clear, needs to be concise
, needs to be accurate andtruthful, and then it absolutely
you need to be able tounderstand what you can talk
about and what you can't, andthat's, that's an understanding
(24:56):
that you know.
Everybody has a number ofpotential crises that they can
think of.
Every industry has veryspecific industry crises.
So, if you understand yourbusiness and that's something
that I'd say to a lot ofcommunicators make sure you
understand the business of thecompany and you can put together
so many potential scenariosthat you can get approved and
(25:20):
you can get ready to go thatonly need a couple different
details put in there.
Also, make friends with thelawyers, because in a crisis,
lawyers and communicators alwayshave to work together and make
sure that they understand whatyou do and you're you know if,
if the decision is, or if thebest interest is not to
(25:42):
communicate, you're not going tocommunicate.
It's not.
You're not like compelled tocompletely give away the whole
store of information justbecause you have the opportunity
and I think that there's a lotof miscommunication between
silos and organizations.
Yes, Yep, so build thoserelationships.
Build your holding statements,figure out who your spokesperson
.
Yes, Yep, so build thoserelationships.
Build your holding statements,figure out who your spokesperson
(26:05):
is.
Dr. Leah OH (26:05):
Yeah, yeah, I really love that.
Figure out ahead of time whatyou can communicate like what.
What can we share and what dowe?
What is proprietary?
What needs to stay just inhouse?
Stephanie Craig (26:20):
Well, and a good example of that is
ransomware.
So most companies haveransomware insurance.
Yeah, does everybody know whatthat ransomware insurance says?
Yeah, does the ransomwareinsurance prevent you from
talking?
Does it?
Do you have to talk?
Like, what are the parametersaround that?
(26:43):
Those are things you can findout beforehand.
So, and you should, right,right, and you should be
prepared and, like any of yourbig divisions within your
organization, figure out whatyou need to know about them and
what they need to know about you, what you need to know about
(27:03):
them and what they need to knowabout you.
So, building those internalrelationships, yeah, it's.
I think the part that is sointeresting to me about
communications in crisis is,once you get to the point of
communicating, it's notparticularly you know unique.
Yeah, you, you, you figured outwho your stakeholders are, you
figured out the best way tocommunicate with them, you know
(27:27):
that the information you have isright, cause you've built the
internal relationships and thenyou're just ready to communicate
, and I think something that'sthat's really important for
folks is that, and I think it'sboth for us, as communicators,
to understand, as well as ourinternal partners is that the
(27:53):
news media isn't always ournumber one constituency, and so
if you need to make sure thatthe people that matter most to
you are getting the informationfrom you, and figure out how
that's supposed to and don't getme wrong, I have a deep love of
reporters and what they do is,um, it's very important and um,
(28:15):
they're doing it with fewer andfewer resources, and then I
think that's something tounderstand is that you need to.
If you are going to speak to themedia, you need to figure out
who you're dealing with and whatthey're dealing with, and it's
not.
I think so many folks areconditioned to the.
(28:36):
I'm going to hold a pressconference and I'm going to do
this.
That very well may not be yourbest strategy.
Figure out what the and alsoyou have to figure out the
strength of your spokesperson.
A lot of times in a crisis, itshould be your CEO.
Leadership matters, but if thatCEO is terrible and gruff and
(28:59):
you better get a media training,him or her media training
terrible and gruff and youbetter get a media training him
or her media training, yeah, andyou better understand the right
format for them, yes.
And so I think there's, ascommunicators, there's the
things that we are very good at.
Then there are the things thatwe need to work on building
relationships, making the plans,executing the plans.
(29:23):
Those are things that make forgood communications.
Dr. Leah OH (29:26):
Exactly, I always think, especially when a term
comes to crisis, I like to thinkof the work.
It should be like dominoes,like everything is already lined
up and hopefully we can juststare at them and they look
beautiful.
But the day the crisis happens,we hit the one and it's, it's
already set, we're ready.
Stephanie Craig (29:46):
Well, this is what I mean by when we talk
about trust.
You trust that all thosedominoes are in line and that
when, when you flick the firstone, you know what's going to
happen.
There's no, there's no mystery.
What's going to happen, andthat makes for a really bad day,
to be less bad.
Dr. Leah OH (30:05):
Yes, exactly yes, and not worse.
Right, absolutely, that iscertainly happening.
And shorter and not longer?
Yeah, exactly.
So let's think about all ofyour political experience.
So you know that you haveexperience in both American and
your political experience.
So you know that you've hadexperience in both American and
Canadian political landscapesand I'm wondering if you can
(30:26):
share with us some of theselessons you learned, probably
about resiliency andadaptability, that you use or
that maybe you coach otherleaders to use and apply in
their own organizations.
Stephanie Craig (30:38):
Well, for me, it's always been understanding
what you stand for when you area political leader, because
there are going to be lots ofpeople wanting things from you
and you're going to be wantingto serve a lot of different
constituencies, and I thinkpolitical leaders owe it to
themselves, as well as to thepeople that support them, to be
(30:59):
honest and transparent on whothey are and then letting people
make a decision for who theyare.
Um, I'm just, I'm trying tothink through.
Um, there's a.
I keep thinking back to this.
I was very, very young I don'teven I hadn't even officially
(31:19):
graduated from college yet whenI was on a federal election
campaign in Canada.
And there's this woman and Iadmit I've lost track of her.
Her name is Leslie Thompson andshe was the head of
communications for the Ministerof Foreign Affairs in Canada
Very prominent fella.
But unlike the United States,they have to run for election,
(31:42):
so first and foremost, they aremembers of parliament and then
they are certain members ofparliament are elevated to
cabinet, so, just like everybodyelse, mr Axworthy had to run
for reelection, and him being soprominent that our campaign got
a lot of attention, a lot ofmedia, and we were supposed to
(32:05):
have a town hall at a seniorcenter and we got word before
any, about 20 minutes beforeanybody got there, that seven
seniors were showing up, a roomset for 200.
And I don't know what I guessit was ringing or something like
(32:26):
that and I remember and I waslike just a deer in the lights
and Leslie looked at me and shegoes what are we doing today?
And I thought, lady, like in mymind, I thought, lady, are you
on like drugs?
Like what do you mean?
She goes I don lady, are you onlike drugs?
Like what do you mean?
She goes I don't make.
Well, we're having a town hall.
She's like no, we're not, we'rehaving a round table.
(32:50):
And she just, she's like listen, she's like there's a table in
the back of the room that wewere going to use for sign in,
bring that up here, put 10, 12chairs around the table.
Yeah, we're having a roundtable, love it.
And it was that, that moment ofof yeah.
(33:14):
Just leadership, that she had tosave this, and I've never,
obviously, all these years later, I've never forgotten it, never
forgotten her name, and it justit was a moment for me of okay,
there's, there's no defeat inthis.
You have to figure out how tomake it work.
And I think that campaign wasjust so absolutely impactful for
me, because I remember so manyother issues as um, I'd gotten
(33:36):
to do, uh, prime minister'sadvance, so an advanced team for
the leader.
And it was my first, my firstevent yeah and I got to staff,
um, the first lady and herdaughter and I was 21 years old
and super green and the her,their daughter grabbed me by the
arm.
She said you want to be ajournalist, let's get out there.
(33:57):
And so we went out, went outand I I was watching the scrum
with the prime minister as primeminister, and I can't I cannot
remember this man's name, butthey didn't have kind of like a
little podium for him to standup, like not much, I think it
was.
He would have needed like afoot or two, but the media were
(34:18):
just pressing, pressing,pressing in, and so it would
have looked very, you know, kindof almost like interrogatory,
right yeah, and his head ofadvance pushed his way to the
front and about three feet backfrom the prime minister, he sat
(34:39):
down on the floor.
This man in this like $500 suitjust sat down cross-legged in
front of the prime minister andthey and it pushed the media
back.
And these like these lessonsfrom these just pros, and that's
the adaptability that I thinkfolks need.
You need to be able tounderstand the situation and
(35:01):
what you need out of it andfigure out what to do to make it
happen.
I've never forgotten thoselessons.
Uh, I one of the things that Ilove to do is I love to be a
mentor and um and a support forfolks coming up in the industry,
and those are the things that Itell people you've got to go do
(35:22):
volunteer.
You've got to go do things thatscare you, that are that are
frenetic, that go figure out howto adapt to all these things
and it's it's a lot of fun andso many good skills.
Dr. Leah OH (35:38):
Yeah, yeah, that is so incredible and I think that
shows you the power ofcommunications.
I think a lot of people thinkit's just my verbals.
You're like, nope, that was avery clear nonverbal when that
gentleman sat down, literallytook up that space to be like,
yeah, we're stopping here and Ilove to in that story, of being
(35:59):
like we're having a round table,even the sass to like people
say, what are we doing today,like to play a little bit with
it, and you recognize that whenyou are leaning into these
adaptability muscles and theseresilience muscles, a lot of
confidence I think stems fromthat competence.
(36:19):
Yes, and that is really reallyincredible.
Stephanie Craig (36:25):
Well, it gives you experience, and that's if
anyone has any political inkling.
Even if you don't make a careerout of it, I highly recommend
working on a campaign.
The people are deeplyentertaining.
You also really learn how tomake do with very little, and to
(36:46):
be able to be exposed to thatwhen you're young is important.
And given that communication isso dramatically important to
politics, you really don't finda lot of better communicators
than those that come out ofpolitics, and so go figure out
how they do what they do.
And I think another interestingangle for communicators in
(37:08):
politics is communicators are sowell respected.
It's such an important functionin a political office.
Go figure out what that feelslike.
Go learn from people that knowwhat that feels like.
Dr. Leah OH (37:22):
Yes, I love that.
So really closely related toyour work in politics, but
beyond that as well, let's thinkabout reputation.
So you know that reputation isoften at stake, especially
during a crisis, and I'mwondering what are some kind of
proactive steps that leaders cancan take ahead of time to
(37:46):
safeguard their reputation ortheir organization's reputation?
So when a crisis hits, you knowmaybe that that hit isn't quite
so so deep.
Stephanie Craig (37:58):
Do all the things that I've already talked
about.
There is there are no crises inan organization that don't have
a reputational impact, andsomething that a lot of business
leaders don't understand isthat brand is what you own.
Your reputation is what peoplesay about you.
(38:20):
It's what your stakeholders own.
I like that, and so, as youthink about how you safeguard
your reputation which, let'sjust be honest, leah is now
about 35% of your organizationalvalue, wow, like, think about
that, yeah.
Something intangible anddelicate, is 35% of your
(38:43):
organization's value.
Some people it's even higher,someone's probably a little
lower, but it's valuable.
And so, as people think aboutwhat they need to do for a
reputation, it's understandingthose stakeholders, it's
building that trust with yourstakeholders.
So, when the time comes,because they're the people that
hold your reputation yeah, oneof the most interesting recent
(39:09):
examples of that do you remembermaybe, like six months ago,
there was a little kerfuffleabout a five guys receipts going
around social media.
Oh, mm-hmm.
Because like a hamburger and itwas like $23.
Yes, five guys said nothing.
Do you remember this?
They said absolutely nothing.
It's because they knew theircustomers.
(39:33):
They know how much they'repaying.
It wasn't a surprise to them,but they still keep coming back.
Yeah, and so that understandingof your reputation is really
important and there's a there'sa lot of recent examples of not
(39:55):
understanding who your audienceis, and I think there's some
very complicated ones.
Folks talk a lot about the BudLight issue.
I think that's some verycomplicated ones.
Folks talk a lot about the BudLight issue.
I think that one's verycomplicated because you do have
a lot of differentconstituencies and in a lot of
cases, those constituencies arevery counter to each other.
So that one's very, very, verycomplicated.
(40:17):
And do I think they handled itright?
Not really, but that's becausethey didn't put the effort in to
understand what was going on.
But it's a complicated one.
But you know there's some otherreally good ones Costco.
There was recently a big foodrecall.
Dr. Leah OH (40:37):
Okay.
Stephanie Craig (40:38):
And Costco knew everyone that bought it and
they called them.
Dr. Leah OH (40:41):
Oh, that's incredible, Right, yeah, that's
values Yep, that's constituency.
Stephanie Craig (40:50):
And then those people talk to other people and
so, and then they give them thebenefit of the doubt.
They knew that Costco wouldprobably do something important
like that, yes, yeah, wouldprobably do something important
like that, yes.
And so all of these things thatwe talk about building this
infrastructure to is reputation,resiliency.
Yeah.
(41:10):
And your reputation, and Ithink that if folks take
anything away from what I saidtoday is reputation is not owned
by you.
It is owned by yourstakeholders.
Dr. Leah OH (41:20):
Yeah, yeah, I love that, I love that.
I've never thought about itthat way and you said that like
a light bulb moment, total sense.
But yeah, I think you're right,until someone kind of points
that out.
It's like ah, yes.
Stephanie Craig (41:37):
Absolutely.
Dr. Leah OH (41:39):
So let's continue this idea of kind of getting
ready and crisis proofing asmuch as we can and thinking
about this at the team level inorganizations.
So I'm wondering if you couldshare some insights on how
leaders can cultivate thisculture within their teams,
where they are inherentlyresilient and prepared to face,
(42:03):
you know, any unexpectedchallenge.
Stephanie Craig (42:06):
The two big things would be that has to come
from the top down, they have tofund it, they have to
prioritize it, and I would.
The actionable item is create acore crisis team.
A core crisis team andeverybody on that team has to
have one of two skills the bestteam members have two, that they
(42:33):
have to have a subject matterknowledge and they have to
ability to make decisions.
I've I've never put together acrisis, a core crisis team, that
didn't have a communicator, thehead communicator, the lawyer,
and probably HR, I would say, orit, depending on what kind of
company it is.
(42:53):
So, but definitely thecommunicator and the lawyer, and
it shouldn't be more than eightto 10 people.
Yeah.
And your company culturedictates.
If the CEO or leaders in theteam because sometimes we worked
with a college that had theirpresident was an 800 pound
gorilla, yeah, and if she werein the room, the, the, the team
(43:18):
would, their goal was to pleaseher, not good, the team would.
Their goal was to please her,not good.
And so we worked out a waywhere the team came up with two
recommendations and then therewere two people designated to go
present them to her and shecould decide what they were.
But they got to deliberate,they got to have their best
expert recommendation, that,that thumb on the scale, Um, and
(43:42):
the leadership is alsocritically important.
We did a uh uh simulation witha, a global company, and the CEO
of the company.
They were, they're like in 17countries.
Okay.
Was the first person there everyday.
Hmm, and then?
(44:03):
you kind of figure.
I think he really knew his teambecause oh wait, he would get
there a little bit earlier andeveryone would try to beat him
and what he needed to do, butthat was because he prioritized
it.
He really understood whatneeded to happen.
And that sort of leadership isinvaluable and it also people on
(44:26):
it gives people the confidencethat you take the resiliency of
your company, the resiliency ofyour reputation, seriously when
you invest in protecting it, andthat's a vote of confidence for
the company.
You invest in protecting it andthat's a vote of confidence for
the company.
And people like comfort.
Oh yeah, they like to know thatsomebody is caring what's
(44:48):
happening, that they'reinvesting in helping people
figure out what they need to doto row the boat with them.
Those kind of investments arereally important for a multitude
of reasons.
Dr. Leah OH (45:01):
Yeah, and I think too, I love that you bring so
much of leader values andorganizational values and help
people identify those if theyhaven't quite spelled them out,
because with time, when you'reliving those values, then you
have better retention, right?
Because you have the folks whoself-identify and then the
(45:21):
people are like this doesn'tquite align with mine, that's
fine.
Have the folks whoself-identify and then the
people are like, eh, thisdoesn't quite align with mine,
that's fine, then they canself-select out.
But we're seeing too and you'retalking about building these
teams that are inherentlyresilient, and the modeling, how
it shows up that way as well.
I really love that.
All right.
Let's talk about blind spotslike these vulnerabilities.
(45:43):
So, in your experience, whatare some common vulnerabilities
that are often overlooked Eitherleaders overlook these or
organizations and what are someof your tips for kind of maybe
spotting these before it's toolate?
Stephanie Craig (46:04):
it's too late.
Well, the biggest one we see isis absolutely, is the head in
the sand.
It never going to happen to me.
Um, we have a couple ofdifferent tools that you're that
we have that give folks, um,empirical information to take
leaders to try and shake themout.
Um, that is, uh, what's theword I'm looking for?
Um, that's really the biggestblind spot that we see.
(46:27):
Uh, and then it's other leadersthat are are.
Well, you know, this doesn'taffect me, and those they they
tend to require very, uh,analytical approaches to be able
to to deal with them.
So, for instance, I spoke at aconference this past fall and we
talked about the ramificationson your financial infrastructure
(46:52):
of a reputational crisis.
If your reputation is damaged,your customers go away.
Your supply chain may not wantto do business with you.
So those are both economicshortfalls.
If it's something that requiresinsurance, do you have enough
(47:13):
reserves to be able to coverwhat in between when the
incident happens and when theinsurance pays out, Do you have
enough reserves?
And when you start talking topeople about it that way, they
light bulbs really start to gooff of.
Oh wait, this isn't just to.
I'm going to show my age hereand quote bridget jones um, this
(47:35):
isn't just somebody fanningaround with a press release.
Yeah, they're real businessramifications.
Yeah, and when peopleunderstand that that, I think
one of the reasons that, um, Idon't do a lot of speaking to
communicators is because, by andlarge, communicators get it,
Are my.
(47:55):
You know, evangelism comes intothe other parts of the business
.
The CEO, the CFO, the chieflegal counsel those are the
folks that I want to talk to tomake sure that that they talk to
their communicator, at the veryleast go and, you know, meet
them and figure out what they're, what's keeping them up at
night.
Um yeah, and respect thefunction.
(48:18):
I think is another anotherthing I'd love to yell about
yeah, yeah, yeah, I think you'reright thing.
Dr. Leah OH (48:21):
I'd love to yell about yeah, yeah, yeah.
I think you're right in helpingpeople to recognize that, even
if you think this isn't going toimpact you, this is
interdependent.
Absolutely this organization isnot thriving, you personally
and your team will not bethriving.
Stephanie Craig (48:39):
Yes, well, a good example of that I actually
wrote about this was the SiliconValley Bank.
Okay, I I did not talk aboutthe, you know, financial side of
it.
I am not a CFO, I'm not, don'twork for the SEC.
But one thing that wascritically missing in that whole
situation is they didn't have asenior communications person in
(49:00):
the bank.
Hands down period didn't, and alarge part of what drove their
problem was the way the CEO wascommunicating.
And if there had been acommunications person sitting in
that room saying you can't sayeverything's going to be OK
(49:22):
because people automaticallyassume that it's not right now,
yeah, and those kinds of blindspots on on who can contribute
and who can help you mitigateand spot, I think are are fatal
sometimes.
Dr. Leah OH (49:42):
Mm.
Hmm, yeah, yeah, I agree, Ithink are are fatal sometimes.
Yeah, yeah, I, I agree.
And great example to bring upwatching that one play out was
was pretty painful, absolutelyyeah.
So let's shift gears a littlebit and think about advocacy and
social movements and I knowyou've been involved in a lot of
efforts this way, like I am,als and the force to end
(50:06):
harassment and advocacy, andStephanie is hoping you could
share kind of how socialmovements influence your
approach to crisis managementand reputation repair.
Stephanie Craig (50:18):
Well, it's.
This all comes back to valuesand living your values, and
there are all sorts of valuesacross the spectrum in
organizations.
You know, if you are anadvocacy organization, you wear
your values in your name.
If you were a business, youeither don't have a perspective
(50:38):
or you do have a perspective.
So you know Hobby Lobby,everybody knows kind of what
Hobby Lobby stands for, and sothey understand also how they
are going to react to socialmovements.
And this again is comes back toknowing who your constituents
are.
Ben and Jerry's before theywere sold same kind of thing
(50:58):
understood who theirconstituents were and so they
lived their values in theircompany.
So they, you know, theyunderstood kind of the landscape
for companies that don't theyhave to go back to those.
They have to do the valuesexercise, they have to do the
stakeholder exercise, becausethat gives you clarity in if,
(51:21):
how and when you will engage ina social movement.
And another thing that I wouldhighly recommend if you are a,
an organization that doesbusiness in the United States,
can you be part of a tradeassociation?
(51:43):
Do you need governmentrelations?
Because, given the highlyinterconnected communications in
this world, if somebody takesissue with what you're doing and
you don't have an understandingof the landscape and you don't
understand what you stand for.
You are going to be a floatingin the middle of an ocean.
(52:05):
Yeah.
You need that touchstone forwhen an issue comes knocking.
One of the you know guidanceswe sent out to CEOs after a year
, after January 6th, was youknow, did you make promises last
year?
Where are they?
(52:27):
Yeah, and we are.
We are very um.
We make it a habit to not workon day-to-day politics in our
firm.
All of us come out of politicsbut we don't work in politics.
Um, because we understand thatthere are different approaches
and um.
It makes us better to work withpeople.
(52:48):
We don't always agree with Um,and so it becomes a really good
exercise for us to help Pete,for us to help people work
through, but we want people towork through them, because if
you do not have again, if you donot have that touchstone when
somebody comes knocking, you'renot going to know what to do.
(53:10):
And the other part of it is tomake sure it's congruent
throughout your organization.
Yeah, if you say you believe X,it better be throughout the
entire organization.
Leave X, it better bethroughout the entire
organization.
Yeah, and a lot of folks haveum, a lot of people that do
(53:32):
political giving, a lot of thebigger companies that do giving.
They're very much um, they'redone for strategic reasons.
But understanding how thosestrategic reasons tie into your
reputation and to the peoplethat you value yeah is important
because nothing lives in an onan island anymore yeah
(53:55):
yeah, and for me personally,getting involved in helping
start imals, als and, uh, endingadvocacy, ending harassment and
advocacy were two very personalissues for me, um, and so I
think that, um, I, as an example, um, very tragically, uh, the
(54:18):
actor Eric Dane was diagnosedwith ALS the other week.
The actor Eric Dane wasdiagnosed with ALS the other
week and, despite the fact thatPeople Magazine has had the
founders of I Am ALS on thecover, the reporter went to the
Muscular Dystrophy Associationto quote about ALS and they got
(54:39):
a whole bunch of things wrongand that is a perfect example.
I deeply care about this.
And now my impression of PeopleMagazine is completely off base,
yeah, and so I think thatthat's to me, understanding
those values is very, veryimportant yeah.
Dr. Leah OH (55:01):
Exactly and understanding those values is
very, very important.
Yeah, exactly, and I like to,because I think so many
organizations and I do thinkthis is shifting now with the
political landscape but so manyare like it was just this little
bit of a homework assignment.
Here's our mission statement,here's our vision statement,
Done and they leave it.
Stephanie Craig (55:19):
But I love that idea of actually living it and
being able to speak to itbecause you're embodying it Well
, and something that you saidjust really struck me, which is
if people don't buy into it,they can just move on.
Dr. Leah OH (55:35):
Exactly yeah.
Stephanie Craig (55:37):
If they don't like what you're selling.
Dr. Leah OH (55:39):
Yeah, yep, just move on.
It's not good for them and it'snot good for you, and we know
what to do then, right,absolutely, absolutely, yeah.
So, stephanie, last twoquestions for you, and they're
intertwined, and this is the waythat we end all episodes of the
communicative leader is, youknow, advice or a challenge or a
(56:01):
tip for our titled leaders outthere?
And then the second part isagain what is the pragmatic
leadership or communication tip,advice or challenge for
employees of all ranks andacross all industries?
Stephanie Craig (56:14):
Well for those in the role.
Don't forget that you arevitally important to business.
Mm-hmm.
Don't forget that you arevitally important to business.
There is nobody moves along, noone can sell anything if they
have communications and the thethe end to that is
(56:37):
communications and marketing arenot the same thing and if, if I
had my way, marketing wouldalways report to communications.
Yeah, I love it and I'm sorry,leah, I was thinking about that.
What was the second?
Dr. Leah OH (56:48):
question.
Well, and the second one isjust for all employees.
So we have some folks.
I think, especially after COVID, a lot of folks are like I
don't want the stress with thetitled position, but
self-leadership and growing aspeople.
So those folks who are not in atitle leadership position, but
self-leadership and you know,growing as people.
So those folks who are not in atitle leadership position, you
know any different rank.
What advice, challenge or tipdo you want to leave them with?
Stephanie Craig (57:13):
It never hurts to make friends outside your
circle, and that helps you as aprofessional, that helps you as
a person and it helps yourorganization, Because learning
about what other people do andcreating those relationships
like I said, I'm a collector ofpeople- yes.
Because I love people, I findthem fascinating, I find them
(57:34):
interesting, and just go meetother people in your
organizations because it willmake your experience better and
it will make your industrybetter.
Dr. Leah OH (57:48):
Yes, yes, I love that and it's something.
You're right that for many ofus, it's not the natural
inclination but it's a gamechanger, and a really important
one, absolutely.
Stephanie.
Thank you for sharing yourexpertise with us, your time.
I've learned so much in thisinterview.
I've really enjoyed ourconversation and I learned so
much in this interview.
I've really enjoyed ourconversation and I know our
listeners will as well.
Stephanie Craig (58:05):
Leah, it's been my absolute pleasure, and
anytime you want to chat again,I would love to do it.
Dr. Leah OH (58:12):
All right, my friends.
That wraps up our conversationtoday.
Until next time, communicatewith intention and lead with
purpose.
I'm looking forward to chattingwith you again soon on the
communicative leader.
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