When it comes to corporate risk and resilience, one of the gurus in the industry is our friend and colleague, Richard Levick, who recently gazed into his risk-ridden crystal ball. Richard believes that 2020 will bring precedent-shattering cyber breaches, radical revisions to enterprise risk management, a public relations backlash to the #MeToo movement, litigation funding […]
By Bruce Hennes/Hennes Communications With no barriers to entry, every public relations firm in the U.S. now appears to offer “crisis communications.” They don’t. At least, all of those who claim to don’t. Crisis work requires a different – and often counterintuitive – skill set from the traditional practice of public relations. It’s also an art […]
By Thom Fladung/Hennes Communications The Houston Astros have joined the Chicago Black Sox and Pete Rose in the ranks of the most infamous scandals in Major League Baseball history, with the release of the MLB investigation that Houston front office staff, coaches and players worked to steal other teams’ pitching signs. Some context: Cheating has […]
From Gail Baker, writing in Higher Education Today, a quick primer in crisis management, suitable for any organization, company or government agency. The day starts like any other. Need to handle a complicated personnel issue, post an enrollment update, and answer budget questions. As you prepare to leave for a meeting, there’s a call from […]
By Bruce Hennes, Hennes Communications If you’re a regular reader of this newsletter, you know we’re constantly encouraging you to have a crisis management/crisis communications plan in-place before something happens. We are also constantly reminding you understand that you only have minutes to respond to a crisis situation; to train and test your team; to […]
[By Bruce Hennes, Hennes Communications] David Wolowitz is an attorney with McLane Middleton, a law firm in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. He is also one of the country’s most in-demand experts on sexual misconduct, with a focus on independent schools. We first met David a number of years ago when we served on a panel together. […]
A spectacular fail. From The Washington Post: South Dakota is on meth — at least, that’s the message behind a new anti-drug ad campaign so widely mocked that one marketing expert could only laugh before calling it “a colossal blunder.” The “Meth. We’re On It.” awareness initiative was unveiled Monday by South Dakota Gov. Kristi L. Noem […]
[By Nora Jacobs, Hennes Communications] We are often asked how we interact with a client’s legal team when a crisis strikes an organization. While the traditional view assumes that communications and legal work in constant conflict in the crisis war room, in our experience, these two disciplines can actually complement each other and build […]
[By Bruce Hennes, Hennes Communications] Hennes Communications was founded in 1989 as a full-service public relations firm. In 2001, after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, we became one of the few firms in North America focused exclusively on crisis management and crisis communications. Since then, we frequently work with attorneys, who tend to be the […]
From our esteemed colleague, attorney David Wolowitz: What makes an independent school succeed or fail when crisis strikes? More often than not, the difference hinges on whether the administration and board work collaboratively. The greater the crisis, the greater the stressors on the relationship between the two. Advance planning is critical. A crisis is no […]