Crisis Communication: Speak First, Protect Trust, 310+ Tools

This course contains the use of artificial intelligence.

Companies do not go quiet in a crisis because they have nothing to say. They go quiet because nobody decided in advance who speaks. Here are 318 tools to be ready: 210 ready-to-use templates, checklists, procedures, question lists and matrices, 97 models and methods, 6 services shown on screen and 5 working files.

Open a lecture, take the worksheet, prepare your first-hours plan today.

By the time you agree the wording, the story is already written

Somebody drafts a statement, somebody else checks it with legal, and meanwhile the version of events settles without you. From then on you are contradicting an account that already exists, a much harder job. At the same time employees learn the news from outside, and the internal message, when it comes, sounds different from the public one.

What changes after this course

The spokesperson, the team and the principles are agreed before anything happens. Risks are named and owned in advance. Outside and inside messages match, bad news reaches your people first, and workforce decisions are communicated with care. After the crisis you measure reputation by impact and rebuild trust with a plan.

What is inside: 318 tools, counted lecture by lecture

You do not have to take this number on trust. Open any lecture and read its description: every tool inside is listed there by name.

• 47 downloadable resources: the lecture presentations plus 5 working files, including the First-Hours Crisis Communication Worksheet, the content planning workbook and the employee experience journey map
• 210 ready-to-use tools inside the presentations:
• 58 templates and sample documents: reputation audit, reputation risk map, crisis statement structure, effective messaging canvas
• 44 checklists: crisis preparedness, crisis response team roles, crisis media relations, crisis internal communication
• 43 step-by-step procedures and workflows: reputation early warning, crisis social media response, executive interview preparation, key message design
• 36 question lists and scripts: risk culture audit, communication focus groups, communication channel selection, conflict de-escalation self-talk
• 19 scorecards, rubrics and matrices: stakeholder power-interest matrix, RACI matrix, probability-impact risk heatmap, crisis communication plan and schedule
• 6 formulas and metric sets: CEO personal brand KPIs, PR output-outcome-impact metrics, five communication evaluation areas
• 4 ready AI prompts: PR budget defense roleplay, employer brand strategy, recruitment outreach
• 97 models and methods explained with examples: Message House, Barcelona Principles, AMEC Integrated Evaluation Framework, RepTrak reputation model
• 6 services shown on screen, including LinkedIn, Workvivo and Loom

Where the tools are

• Reputation and crisis leadership (2 sections, 62 tools). Reputation as an asset, the spokesperson, the response team and reputation metrics.
• Risk (3 sections, 65 tools). Heat maps, bias, ISO 31000, risk culture, the three lines of defence and accountability.
• Workforce crisis (2 sections, 69 tools). Hiring, pay, benefits, development, redundancies, morale and contingency plans.
• Internal crisis communication (2 sections, 46 tools). Audit, goals, employee messages, channels, bad news and measurement.
• Conflict (2 sections, 39 tools). Causes, escalation, negotiation and mediation.
• Reputation recovery (3 sections, 52 tools). Audience research, strategic audit, reputation KPIs, ambassadors and long-term planning.

Who is teaching

I am Mike, the #1 HR instructor on Udemy, with 1,800,000+ course enrollments from 170,000 students, and the author of about 200 books on Amazon. I built the people system at Preply as it became a unicorn and worked at Wargaming, iDeals and Alfa-Bank across 20 years in HR. I hold PHRi, SHRM-CP and HCI sHRBP certifications and represent HRCI in Eastern Europe.

During a difficult period at Wargaming, the internal communications team organised an Ask Me Anything session with the CEO: people sent a long list of questions and he answered them, which helped a lot. At the STB TV channel in 2013 and 2014, when news crews worked in dangerous areas, I had to list the risks, assess their probability and impact, and write down what we would do in each scenario.

How to use the course

Start with the First-Hours Worksheet and the crisis leadership sections, then prepare risk, workforce, internal communication and recovery plans before you need them. Section and lecture titles show how many tools are inside, and each lecture description lists them by name.

What is included

• 44 lectures across 15 sections, 22.5 hours
• 47 downloadable resources: lecture presentations and five working files
• 318 tools across the lessons, including 6 services shown on screen
• Lifetime access to all materials
• Active instructor support in the Q&A section
• A Udemy Certificate of Completion

Where to start

Write down who will speak for your organisation if a crisis starts tonight, and who approves the first statement. Enrol now and start your first lesson today.

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