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Crisis averted

Incident management for social housing

Crisis communications is a key part of public relations. We work with brands to safeguard their reputation when an incident arises, creating an honest dialogue with the media to re-balance perceptions.

We provide crisis management training, making sure clients are prepared for if and when an incident may arise, and how to deal with situations effectively. Our ongoing work with leading Cornish social housing provider, Ocean Housing Group, began with an initial crisis management training session, and developing an incident plan.

Why is crisis management important?

Communication is key at the time of a crisis. People like to be kept up to date with any developments, and a company’s response to the situation. As well as reputation management, good crisis communications help to show you care about people in the situation, and that you are being proactive in sorting things out.

The brief

Ocean Housing manages more than 4,500 properties throughout Cornwall, and with that comes the responsibility of making sure thousands of tenants are safe and secure in their homes. Its sister company, Gilbert & Goode, is also one of the largest construction businesses in the county.

With such accountability, there are a number of stakeholders which require careful management in the time of a crisis. We were appointed to deliver a session to Ocean Housing Group’s senior leadership team to identify potential scenarios, and help to develop an incident plan so everyone had an understanding of how the company will deal with certain situations. We also ran a separate media training session, which prepared the senior team for live interviews.

The training

We ran two training sessions independently, however the complementary skills and knowledge covered across both ensured the Ocean team was fully prepared for handling incidents with an appropriate response.

Our training sessions included…

Crisis management training

The crisis lifecycle: identifying the types of response required at each stage of an incident.

Developing an incident plan:

  • Created an incident team with contact information, and a clear programme for implementation.
  • Identified stakeholders.
  • Risk analysis of potential scenarios.
  • Identified severity of impact and likelihood of occurrence for each scenario.
    prepared holding statements.

Media training

  • Knowing when to engage with the media.
  • Preparation for leading questions.
  • Simulation of a TV interview with a test scenario.
  • Review and analyse filming of the interview.

Social media

The effective management of social media is becoming increasingly important as more and more people look to air their opinions and complaints via these platforms. We provided training to the customer service team at Ocean Housing to outline the best way to respond to comments in order to help control any situation.

Further support

Our continued PR work with Ocean Housing Group includes live incident management, supporting the business with journalist liaison, producing holding statements, and monitoring situations in the media.

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