By now we know what is a crisis. But how important is the communication during a crisis?
There are four stages to a crisis:
1. Risk Prone: A situation is first risk prone.
2. Issue: A risk prone situation if not managed well turns into an issue.
3. Crisis: An issue turns into a crisis.
4. Disaster: The crisis if not well managed turns into a disaster.
A crisis cannot be ‘controlled’; it can only be ‘contained’ !
We’ve all been hearing of people and/or brands undergoing crisis. But what do you really mean by crisis and when can it be assumed that a person or brand is said to be in crisis?
When something w.r.t to a product or service has gone wrong and the media has started writing about it, is when a crisis arises.
Crisis can be broadly classified under five categories:
1. People Crisis – When there’s an abuse of any kind , violence,unethical practices or fraud involved.
2. Environmental Crisis – When there’s an issue with emission or pollution.
3. Financial Crisis- Issues relating to bungling, bankruptcy, losses, bad management, unethical bribery.
4. Contamination- Issues related to food, drugs, adulteration etc.
5. Disaster – Any kind of crashes (aircraft,train etc), natural/man-made calamities.
One of the biggest examples of technology affecting the lives of people is the phone. A phone, which was considered a luxury three decades ago, has now become one of the bare necessities of life. The journey of a phone began with landlines. Not everyone could afford a landline back then. There were barely one or maybe two phones in the block. All calls for anyone in and around the neighbourhood would be on those numbers. When a call for someone else from the block was received, one used to either shout out to the person or send a member of the family to inform them. It was a great way for neighbours to catch up on the local gossip and news.
Then came the cordless phones, which could be carried around to a certain distance. It was merely used for convenience where one would carry the phone around talking as well as continuing with ones work. It was also cool back then to have a cordless phone specially the imported ‘foreign’ ones!
Late 90’s saw the rise in use of mobile phones. And by 2005, there was tremendous increase in mobile phone usage with multiple service providers competing with each other to attract customers with cheaper plans. Now, being seen without a phone is unthinkable! Nomophobia is a proposed name for the phobia of being out of mobile phone contact. In fact, by the remotest chance if you come across someone who doesn’t own a phone let alone a smart phone, that person is looked upon as an alien from some remote planet!!!
Carrying the latest smartphone has not only become a trend but is also looked upon as a status symbol. The latest and fancier your phone, the cooler you are considered. Is it just the looks and price of the phones that attract customers or the features of phone also influence the buyers? Would people consider a phone which priced lower but provides the same look and feel, including the features as another phone priced at unreasonably high rates? The answer is both yes and no. While most of the millennials believe in going for the brand image even if it means paying a bit more, there is quite a large percentage of consumers who would go for a phone which is lighter on the pocket and at the same time provides similar features as the high-end counterpart.
So what are the features that interest the consumers of today’s market? Does anyone even use all the features that they so deeply research over before purchasing a phone, or rather, what is it that most people use their phones for?
While there are quite many uses of a phone, following are some interesting uses I came across during my study on the use of phones.
Did you know:
You might have the most expensive phone with a high resolution camera, storage space enough for an elephant to sleep in, best sound quality which might turn you deaf, but all said and done, sometimes the most a phone is used for is something as simple as to check time!
How to Pay Less For More by Marc Lockley is a consumer’s guide to negotiating the best deals – of whatever you buy.
What I like about the book is that Marc Lockley relates the basic skills of negotiations in a very simple manner and applies them to common situations that everyone more or less experiences while shopping or at home or the workplace.
He brings simplicity to the process of a satisfying negotiation. The language used is very simple which makes it easy for the readers and also keeps them interested.
However, using a few personal experiences as references would make it easier for the reader to relate to.
There always is a first time for everything, no matter which stage of life you are in. In my case this time, it was my first experience with PR firms.
I have worked for a good number of years in the IT corporate world. However, the visits last week were a whole new experience. I’m still trying to figure out which category to note them under – good or bad?
One of the best part of the entire exercise was my company. I was lucky enough to be paired with someone who I could get along with super effortlessly. The entire exercise was so much fun and never felt like a task. Thank God for that!
So like I said, there were lot of ‘firsts’ that day. To begin with, in my almost 6 years of work life I have NEVER worn semi formals let alone complete formals and here I was in a crisp ironed three piece formal. I was sweating through the AC of my class. Oh yes, we attended classes in the first half and then left for the visit. What a hardworking bunch right!
As luck would have it, Mumbai chose to be very bright and sunny on that particular day. After getting done with the classes and a couple of must-have selfies we finally left for Bandra station. By God, it was so damn hot! I’m sure I lost at least half a kilogram of my weight by the first half an hour. Here begins the next of my firsts. We comfortably managed to get into the train which for once wasn’t too crowded.
My lady luck loves me to the extremes. So when she decides to keep the weather sunny, its scorching hot and when she decided to cool it down for me, we were showered with blessings from the Rain God. Imagine walking on the streets of Dadar wearing formals in the rains having just one umbrella to save ourselves.
Well somehow we managed to walk through all this and finally reached the Mahatre Pen Building where Perfect Relations had their office. It took us a while to process the environment. One of the worst locations if I may say. The pan-spit walls, the stairs covered with bird crap. There was barely space for us to walk up. On reaching the office, we were informed that the person we were to meet had just left for a meeting and hence wasn’t available. We sat there clueless wondering what to do next. We then spoke to her assistant about the purpose of our visit which was to encourage the young employees of the firm to apply for the #ABCPrize sponsored by our organization PRomise Foundation. After handing out couple of posters to be pinned on their notice board, we left from the office. And to be honest we were glad to be out of there. That was our first experience with a PR firm which was not even half of what we expected.
#LessonLearnt: Never have any hopes.
Now where next? Wait for my next blog….. 😉
Sumitha Naik 