Oil Boss Deals with Catastrophe with Care and Concern

It’s your worst nightmare at work: taking that phone call that says there’s been a fatality. No matter how long you’ve been with the comms team or how tough a PRO you are, nothing can really prepare you.  There is that overwhelming feeling of shock followed by a hundred questions in your head which you don’t know the answer to.  Then you have to put your own emotions aside as you know the media will soon be hammering on your door expecting/demanding answers.

Imagine then how the Oil and Gas UK in Aberdeen must have felt when they heard of the tragic helicopter crash carrying their employees from their oil rig to the mainland. But hats off to them, and the rest of the industry, who managed the whole scenario with dignity and compassion.  With such a tragedy it’s hard not to deliver a knee jerk reaction as all around make claims and counter claims as to the cause of the accident. The company’s chief executive was interviewed earlier this week and delivered a measured and controlled response; he demonstrated care and concern to the families and the close knit oil community of Aberdeen and accepted the need to ground all the Puma aircraft. Not an easy thing to do.

It comes as no surprise that the oil industry has a well organised crisis media management strategy. Planned and rehearsed time and time again. Having delivered media training to various multinational oil companies, as well as the Government's own Maritime and Coastguard Agency on major incident exercises we know first hand how important the oil industry takes managing the media in a crisis.

One of the key points we work on when running this type of crisis management training is to emphasise the need to connect with the audience: to not descend into corporate speak but to keep it human; to demonstrate how much the crisis has affected the company (not the profits but the people); to explain what you are going to do about it and to show control by explaining what the way forward will be. Desk top crisis exercises are great when you’re trying to plan the logistics of who should be where and when. However, it’s only by running a practical session that all your key spokespeople can experience what they need to do to get the right message across when faced with intense media attention.

The key to any successful crisis management is to have a plan whereby everybody knows what is needed, where it’s needed and when. There needs to have been sufficient preparation so that when it does goes wrong there is a failsafe communications strategy that swings into action, buying everybody a bit of time to regroup and manage the situation effectively.

The media will give you a much easier time if you are drip-feeding them pieces of information rather than nothing at all. As can be seen from the news reports. Because the company has given as much information as is reasonably possible, the cries that oil companies have been irresponsible by using this particular helicopter are no more than the usual sabre rattling’s. The general public appears to have accepted that enough has been done – thus buying the company time to regroup and face the future.

You can watch the TV interview with Malcolm Webb, Chief Executive of Oil and Gas UK here.

Media First are media and communications training specialists with nearly 30 years’ experience. To find out more about our highly practical crisis management training, contact us here. Don't forget to subscribe to our blog.