In a crisis - such as the one Maple Leaf Foods Inc. CEO Michael McCain faced after the outbreak of listeriosis - chief executive officers have to respond to the public's need for information. On his Great Leadership blog, Dan McCarthy, manager of leadership and management development for a Fortune 500 company, details these 15 rules:
1. Don't speculate about what happened or about what could happen.
2. Don't cover up, lie or hedge.
3. Don't qualify sympathy, as in, "We're sorry this happened, but ..."
4. Don't assign blame. The immediate intent is to resolve the crisis. Finding fault, if necessary, will come later.
5. Don't promise anything that you can't deliver. It is better to underpromise and then deliver more, than to overpromise and come up short.
6. Don't walk into a press conference or any kind of presentation unprepared.
7. Do get the facts as quickly as you can, to the best of your ability.
8. Do show up in person. You are the leader, and people want to hear from you.
9. Do give the facts.
10. Do be honest about what you know and don't know.
11. Do acknowledge and show sympathy for human suffering.
12. Do accept responsibility for handling the crisis (but not causing it).
13. Do give all the bad news at once. Leaking out bad news a little bit at a time just exacerbates the crisis and undermines your credibility.
14. Do make a list of the five questions you would least like to be asked and be prepared to answer them, since somebody will undoubtedly ask them.
15. Do set up a rumour control hotline or website if rampant speculation could fuel the crisis.
