The aim of this paper is to present and discuss some of the main findings from a large survey of internal crisis management and crisis communication conducted in the spring of 2011 among public and private organizations in Denmark (the ICMCC survey). The survey was conducted among the 367 largest private companies (selected from DK 1000, established by Børsen business magasin) and among 98 public organizations (municipalities). The overall goal was to get a preliminary idea of how these companies or organizations perceive, plan, coordinate and implement internal crisis management and crisis communication activities before, during and after a crisis. The survey questionnaire comprised 36 questions and was sent to respondents who typically are responsible for the crisis-preparedness of their organizations. The results from the survey show that the vast majority of organizations have a crisis or contingency plan, and most of these plans contain an internal dimension relating to the management and communication with the internal stakeholders during a crisis. Thus, the study shows a rather professional and formalized behavior towards crisis management in general, but also when it comes to managing a crisis in relation to the internal organizational stakeholders in specific. In addition, the results clearly indicate a strong relation between organizational size and crisis management; the larger the organization the more likely to have a crisis plan. This particularly pertained to the private organizations. The ICMCC survey forms part of a major collaborative research project, financed by the Danish Council for Independent Research/Social Sciences (2011–2014), entitled Internal Crisis Management and Crisis Communication in Danish Organizations. The purpose of this three-year long project is to shed light upon the role of internal crisis management and crisis communication before, during and after an organizational crisis and/or a societal crisis leading to downsizing or major changes within an organization or an organizational field.
To create organizational commitment and identification is one of the important challenges for internal communication in private and public organizations. However, the challenge seems to grow bigger when the organization finds itself in a crisis situation. Studies have shown that employees, who used to be proud of their organization, change their perception of the organization according to crisis type (product recall, mismanagement, rumors, etc.), and the manager's handling of the crisis situation (cf. Aggerholm, 2009 and Mansour-Cole and Scott, 1998).
Within the last decade or so, crisis communication researchers have primarily focused on the external dimension of crisis communication, that is, the crisis response strategies applied by an organization after a crisis in an attempt to restore or protect its image and/or reputation among external stakeholders (Benoit, 1995, Coombs, 1999 and Johansen and Frandsen, 2007). However, we still know only very little about what is going on inside an organization in crisis (cf. Frandsen & Johansen, 2011). Apart from a few exceptions as for instance research studies in crisis sensemaking in continuation of Karl Weick's seminal article “Enacted sensemaking in crisis situations” (1988), the organization internal dimension of crises, crisis management and crisis communication have by and large been unexplored.
The studies conducted within the field of crisis sensemaking are first and foremost characterized by qualitative case studies with the purpose of examining how organizational members create meaning at an organizational micro-level as a crisis unfolds in various contexts, or how sensemaking takes place at a societal macro-level at the end of a crisis through the study of reports and other documents from public inquiries.
The purpose of this paper is different. With this paper we want to present and discuss the main findings from a large, quantitative survey of internal crisis management and crisis communication conducted in the spring of 2011 among public and private organizations in Denmark by a group of researchers at ASB Center for Corporate Communication, Aarhus University. The survey is termed the Internal Crisis Management and Crisis Communication Survey (hereafter: the ICMCC survey). More specifically, the aim of the survey is to answer how middle managers, who are knowledgeable about and responsible for the internal crisis management and/or crisis communication function in private and public organizations perceive the following four areas:
(a)
Organizational crises in general (including experiences of previous crises).
(b)
The typical patterns of reaction and the typical perception of causes, development and consequences in crisis situations among the organizations’ top and middle managers as well as employees (among these: the impact of factors such as type of crisis, job function and educational background).
(c)
The formal crisis-preparedness within the organization classified into (1) internal crisis management (e.g. formulated crisis management plans, crisis management teams and other proactive steps taken to handle in particular the internal crisis dimension) and (2) internal crisis communication (e.g. communication channels, appointment of internal spokespersons, communication from top and middle management as well as the role of the news media).
(d)
The quality of the organizations’ formal internal crisis-preparedness and the need to improve this crisis-preparedness.
As mentioned above, such a comprehensive, empirical study of the internal dimensions of crises, crisis management and crisis communication within organizations has never been conducted before. General surveys of the crisis-preparedness of private and/or public organizations have already been conducted (cf. Frandsen & Johansen, 2004), but nobody has so far brought up the crucial question: How do organizations deal with the organization internal dimension?
The paper consists of six sections. First, the literature on internal crisis management and crisis communication is reviewed. Second, we make a general introduction to the collaborative research project, financed by the Danish Council for Independent Research/Social Sciences (2011–2014), entitled Internal Crisis Management and Crisis Communication in Danish Organizations, which the survey is part of. Third, the theoretical framework and the research questions of the ICMCC survey are briefly presented. Four, the research design is explained, and five, we present selected results. Finally, we discuss the results with specific reference to the correlations between internal crisis management/crisis communication, on one hand, and factors such as organizational size and having a crisis management plan/a crisis management team, on the other. We conclude with a few statements concerning the limitations of the study and implications for future research.
The ICMCC survey has produced a large amount of results concerning the organization internal dimension of crises, crisis management and crisis communication in private companies and municipalities in Denmark. We now know a lot more about this particular field of practice in Danish organizations than we did before. It is our overall impression that many organizations are very active when it comes to optimizing their formal crisis-preparedness. Compared to the situation in 2003 (cf. Frandsen & Johansen, 2004), more organizations today have formulated a crisis management plan, and more organizations have appointed a crisis manager or established a crisis management team. One point of surprise is the many important differences between the crisis management/crisis communication activities of private and public organizations. Municipalities seem to have their own approach to internal crisis management and crisis communication. They define crises in different ways, they have experienced different types of crises, and their employees react to crises in different ways. In the following, we will discuss some of the results presented in the previous section.
Mitroff (2005, pp. 147–149) claims that “every major crisis is experienced as an act of betrayal”, and he distinguishes between seven types of betrayal caused by top management (economic, information, physical, human resources, reputation, psychopathic acts, and natural disasters). However, our results showed that the feeling of betrayal, together with panic, the feeling of shame and leaving the organization, is not perceived as that frequent as a reaction to organizational crises among employees.
As already mentioned in Section 6.1, there is neither a correlation between organizational size and the typical reactions to crises among employees, nor a correlation between having a crisis management plan and the typical reactions to crises among employees. However, there is a strong correlation between having a crisis management team/a crisis manager in the organization and the typical reactions to crises among employees. Organizations that have established a crisis management team or appointed a crisis manager seem to experience loss of motivation and engagement to a lesser extent than organizations without this strategic instrument. Their employees are perceived to be less frustrated, they feel less insecure, and are less afraid in a crisis situation. The employees also do not seem to leave the organization in crisis.
Our results showed that the majority of both private organizations (73%) and municipalities (90%) had a crisis management plan, and of those having a crisis management plan the vast majority contained elements specifically addressing the handling of the internal dimensions of a crisis, indicating a high level of awareness among the respondents of the importance of the handling of a crisis in relation to internal stakeholders. The internal elements of the crisis management plan were less prevalent among the municipalities, where almost every four respondent (23%) indicated the absence of these. In sum, the municipalities seem in general to be better equipped in terms of formal crisis management or contingency plans, however, they appear to have less focus on the internal dimension compared to private organizations. In addition, despite the high prevalence of crisis and contingency plans, in general, our analysis also shows that more than every four private organizations (27%) do not have such a formalized, agreed-upon plan in case of a crisis, indicating that among these organizations, crisis management might be perceived more as an ad hoc assignment, which is dealt with when the crisis occurs.
Almost two out of three of the respondents indicated that they had a formally appointed person or crisis team responsible for managing a crisis, and within the majority of these teams communication with the employees seemed to be given high priority as 91% of the private organizations and 82% of the municipalities, respectively, indicated that they had assigned a team member to be responsible for the internal communication in the event of a crisis. Thus, the results from this group of respondents show a rather professional and formalized behavior towards crisis management in general, but also when it comes to managing a crisis in relation to the internal stakeholders in specific.
Intuitively, one might assume that large organizations would manage crises more professionally due to accumulated knowledge and organizational learning on the basis of previous crisis experiences as well as having a wider range of human resource competencies. Our study confirmed this assumption as the results clearly indicated a strong relation between organizational size and crisis management; the larger the organization the more likely to have a crisis management plan. This particularly pertained to the private organizations.
How has the formal crisis-preparedness developed since 2003? In 2003, the first large national survey of the crisis-preparedness of private companies and public authorities in Denmark was conducted among 750 respondents (Frandsen & Johansen, 2004). The response rate was 40% (N = 298, private companies: N = 160, municipalities: N = 64, and other public authorities: N = 74). Although the internal dimension of crisis management and crisis communication only represented a minor part of the survey, it included questions concerning the use of internal communication channels in a crisis situation, specific guidelines to employees as well as the role of internal stakeholders.
Comparing the present survey with the 2003 study, some interesting findings can be traced concerning the use of internal communication channels. As it appears from Table 2 above, internal crisis communication generally receives more attention in 2011 than in 2003, and this among both private companies and municipalities. Face-to-face communication (i.e. meetings) is considered a very important channel, and the use of e-mails and intranet have become as important as face-to-face communication. The use of employee magazines and newsletters has increased. Although it continues to be a channel, which is used less frequently and thus can be considered of less importance compared to other channels, the use of text messages has tripled since 2003, whereas the use of bulletin boards has decreased with 20%.
Furthermore, the size of the organizations also plays an important role for the choice of channels: the larger the organization, the less likely it is to use joint meetings, and the more likely is it to use intranet, departmental meetings, employee magazines and newsletters, text messages, internal blogs, and internal social media.
The results from the 2011 survey seem not only to indicate a high focus on top and mid-level management communicating to employees, having internal spokespersons, persons within the crisis teams being responsible for the communication with employees as well as on explaining external messages internally. The results also seem to show an increased focus on what may be communicated externally (guidelines and policies on the part of employees) and on the role of the employees as organizational ambassadors in relation to both internal and external stakeholders (more than 40% of the respondents answered in the affirmative to this question). However, the sample shows that managers primarily are aware of or have knowledge about the employees as initiators of communication in crisis situations, when it comes to communication inside the workplace. With good reason, they are less knowledgeable about crisis communication habits of the employees when it comes to communicating with family at home and/or with friends and relatives through social media such as Facebook.
