crisis communications

A crisis is a major catastrophe that may occur either naturally or as a result of human error, intervention or even malicious intent. Natural crisis is unavoidable while human crisis is avoidable. In crisis by human error, a company is directly responsible, and constituencies will look to the organization’s response to the crisis before making a final judgment.
Companies have had to go through various crises. Some companies have been able to get through theses and some have just disappeared due to them.
At the time of crisis, communication goals should contribute to ending the crisis, gathering as much information as possible to protect your organization’s reputation, reducing tension, demonstrating commitment to values, communicating to media as early as possible, communicating directly with affected constituents, communicating promptly and continuously to maintain control of flow of information.

reference:

http://www.12manage.com/methods_crisis_management_advice.html

http://www.insight.co.uk/files/datasheets/Crisis%20Management%20(Datasheet).pdf