 Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the CEO Institute seminar on effective CEO leadership in a crisis. I'm joined this afternoon by Jacqueline Wilcox and Scott Bennett from East Rugby who I'll be introducing a little bit later. But before I do that I'll give you a bit of an idea and set the scene for how we'll run this afternoon. It's going to be very informal. We're going to open up the floor for questions in about 12 minutes. If you do have questions you can go on to your player. On the bottom right hand corner there is a questions button so just it's called ask a question. Just press that and by all means ask a question and we'll come to that during the course of today's seminar. Just a little bit about myself. I'm currently managing director for company called Grantsville Capital who provides supply chain finance globally for large corporates. Prior to that I've worked in large corporates myself in Asia for just over a decade in global roles with Philips and probably more recently here in Australia I've done a number of startups involved in startups run three listed entities Engine, Look Mobile, Mobile Innovations and then I think more recently Anital and then overseas we did a startup called myriad group whereby we had 3 billion mobile handsets. We did a software for Apple, Microsoft and Google who are main three clients. I'm on the board of a chairman at the National Center for Suicide Prevention and Training currently and I do a fair amount of advisory work. I'm a chair at the Sea Institute. I chair two groups Syndicate 61 and Syndicate 70 and the range of brands involved in those groups range from Clemenja BBTO up to Woolworths so it's quite varied in terms of the participation that we have in those groups. So welcome again. What we'll do is I'll introduce our panel and our guest speakers. Firstly I have an apology from Michael Steele. Those that are in Sydney will be well aware that we've got some terrific storms outside so a crisis in the making to a certain extent but Michael Steele, his house is under some pressure and he has to resolve some personal issues at home so he's sent his apologies. Michael's from Pacific West Foods. I also have with me the group CEO for East Rugby which does include the Mighty Roosters. He's also Michael's, sorry Scott's also a member of the Australian Club Gaming Council. He originally started work at the Sydney Harbour Casino which is now known as Star City Casino. He has a degree from the University of Wollongong in a Bachelor of Commerce majoring in marketing and he's also done a diploma in business in club management. So welcome today and thanks for your participation. Our guest speaker today is Jacqueline Wilcox. Jacqueline is the Executive Vice President and head of Corporate and Public Affairs for Webber, Shandwick, Australia. She's an expert in corporate and public affairs and specifically in crisis recovery and I think we'll get quite a lot of experience in terms of some of the companies that you've dealt with most recently. We were having a little bit of a conversation earlier. She's very well known for crisis management and advising CEOs on how to effectively deal with the issues at hand and that's across a number of sectors including defence, mining, shipping, pharmaceutical, infant formula which I'm sure everyone's aware of and obviously food and beverages which will go into a fair bit of detail. She's an experienced journalist having worked at the ABC, Channel 10 and the Australian so welcome Jacqueline. Thank you. So what I might do is just to kind of set the tone a little bit. Ask Jacqueline to maybe give us some background on your experience in terms of crisis management and maybe talk to her one or two case studies and whilst Jacqueline's doing that please don't hesitate to hop online and ask questions by hitting that ask that question button on the bottom right hand corner of your player. Well look thank you for that. I thought I would I thought I was coming here today to talk about the infant formula crisis that we had in New Zealand where some infant formula was wrongly branded contaminated by botulism and the company rightly withdrew batches of that product knowing that their own testing was showing that there was nothing wrong with it and then of course weeks later discovered that they were right and that their product was never contaminated but nonetheless they've incurred great deal of brand damage plus you know a great deal of financial loss. So I thought I'd talk about that because one we're quite proud of it. It was it crossed eight jurisdictions so there were multiple recalls in different countries however when I thought we're done and dusted with infant formula I've actually just stepped off the plane from New Zealand where I have been dealing with another infant formula crisis fortunately not just for this brand but for the unfortunately for the entire for the for all infant formula and that is that unfortunately in New Zealand many of you will know that a for want of a better term terrorist has threatened to put 1080 in all infant formula should the government not exceed to this person's demands and so you can imagine what that's like over there that's like that for all brands so you know you just think you've actually dusted one crisis and you've got that company through when you're helping that company in recovery and then lo and behold something like this comes along which is quite devastating for everybody involved so where would you like to start what would I say to a CEO if they rang me today and sit and said that and we were talking earlier about how one approaches you know any crisis and what I would say and what we were discovering earlier is that if you have some sort of plan you're halfway there if you've actually sat down with your management team and doesn't matter if it's 15 or 2 or 3 and you've developed a plan of what one does in a crisis and everybody knows their roles you're halfway there even if you decide that you have to check that out even if you decide on the day that actually it's not relevant at least you've had the discipline in your thinking that you you know you're in the process so that's one of the things I would say the other thing I would say without wanting to scare everybody is that good things comes from crisis and one of the things I've learned recently with say the Denon Nutrisha contaminated well actually it was Fonterra contaminated product that went into the Denon Nutrisha product but what I would say is that that company learned a lot about itself a lot of good things the CEO was two days in the in the country she'd only just arrived that week when lo and behold Friday at six o'clock this hits so she got to know her management team really well and she dived in and she she fortunately starred and Sean and she continues to do that so there's some good things that come from it so on that particular incident did the company actually have a plan in place yes we're officially a company who probably wasn't even aware what the plan was look I think that she's from the company she was an internal in another jurisdiction but the company fortunately is well known for its training and as luck would happen about two weeks before this hit I was involved in a real-life scenario with the company on the site she wasn't there of course but with the management team and we were going through a number of scenarios and really one of them was roughly what actually happened so it was all a bit spooky actually when we're sitting around the boardroom at two o'clock in the morning drinking diet coke and eating silly food we were all remarking on how like like the scenario it was she had been through a lot of training she was about to be media trained by me the following week we never got around to that we were media training in the back of cabs and all sorts of things so I have to say that the company being being a training company that shone through but yes they have their own they had their own protocol they had their own everybody knew what their role was some that was tested of course some people shone in those roles some people realized that they weren't as good in the role that they thought they would be and they've mixed around but I think the training was absolutely vital in in them getting through it and in terms of message and getting her on message we're very we're next to no training and briefings in the back of cabs I mean how effective was that in terms of reducing stress on the company to start off with and employees that are involved in the whole process everyone does get quite anxious when something negative starts occurring in the business how quickly were you able to get her briefed and and trained up to make sure that the message that was going out was effective and simple well fortunately she was there from the moment that the phone call came in it just search you know we've got the phone call from the regulator and suddenly everybody's doing their own roles and I get I got called in so she knew the brief but I think what was interesting is that we she because I think she's so well trained just the type of person that she is she was trusting people so so she decided that I was there as an advisor and she was going to trust me which took a lot of courage given that she didn't really know me and that was quite helpful because I was able to stand back and say well look we don't need to go in there and say as much as people want us to say we need to hold back we need to be responsive to the media but we also need to be responsible and I think this is where the real guidance comes in when you actually can make that judgment about how much do you say and that doesn't mean that you don't say much at all but it means when do you roll out your CEO when do you have people like my team handling the media and telling the media you know the answers and so we decided we made a decision with her that we would only put her in front of the media when we had something to say something new to say something informative because we were dealing with parents here who had to feed their babies and we would knew the emotion of that and we had a call centre that was being inundated with frantic mums what do I feed my baby so we had to make sure that we did nothing to exacerbate their their fears but we also did as much as we could to make them feel comfortable in the role you know in the decisions that they had to make so we only wheeled her out can I say to the media I think it's about three or four times now there was it and I have to say there were times when I was looking at myself in the mirror in the morning going did I make the right decision but I'm glad we did it because at the end of it it turned out that there were other people out there sadly because they were giving messaging that wasn't right and then they would have to subsequently take up full page advertisements to correct what they were saying we decided we actually did do the right thing that she and also the journalists knew that when we called a media conference and she was going to be there they knew that there was something new to say and that something that was going to either you know change the way the the the crisis was going we are able to give some answers no point in wheeling at your CEO if all they're going to do is repeat the same old same old so in terms of the reputational damage was there a measure done for what that impact was in dollar terms for that particular business and how much of the management of that you know I helped to limit that impact well I would of course said the management was massively good and it stopped all sorts of problems happening but what I can say is of course you actually have a people who are in this industry know that you have sales and you have you have all sorts of measurement in that area and I won't go into that we certainly know we did that those people are expert had it and they certainly can make that judgment what I can say and this is where it was very pleasing is that the call centre and the helpline got some very good feedback from from the call from from the mums who are using the product feeding it to their babies and the other thing that came out was the media commentary she was actually praised on some of the media programs and people said that she was caring and she was concise and she was considered unfortunately some of the other players in there for various reasons weren't so so she got a great deal of positive signs from that and we and in that comes the problems because because she was quite well regarded then the media want more and you still have to then hold back and say no no no we don't have anything more to say we don't want to waste anybody's time so yeah there's a lot of measurement that that is done and some of it is actually a bit of judgment that that experience people make and in terms of advice to a CEO when when they are in that crisis mode and about about to hit what what what are the top four points that you make look I think it each crisis is is different I mean that's you know a terrible old saying but it's true but I have to say that where there has been some suffering or pain caused in any situation one has to always acknowledge that you can when you're in a crisis get caught up with handling the nitty gritty of it but you have to at the end of the day remember that you're talking to people who are whose lives have been changed in some way whether it's you know a terrible tragedy or whether it is that they just terribly inconvenienced one has to keep remembering that and and and it reminding not only yourself and your team of that but also letting the people know that you are aware of that so I think that that's absolutely right don't don't do a conference unless you've got something to say you've got a lot of media staff a lot of advisors who can handle that media so don't be bullied into doing things you don't want to do and you know there's some classics examples of some people going on air being flattered as we say flattered into powerlessness being denied that being demanded by the media and wanting to be the center of attention getting on there and not knowing this subject not having any answers people want a lot of answers in a crisis so I'd say things things like that I think trust your team certainly don't try to do everything that there is really have some roles and designated roles and trust the people who are in those roles what I say to people in my situation as the advisor is that my role is to actually metaphorically stick my arm around my client and say you know I'm with you on this now there is a problem because you are there you are living it and you are feeling their pain but you also have to take a step back sometimes and be quite cruel in the some of the questions that you ask and some of the criticism that you give not all the time but you won't have you know help if you're always going to be on on the team she's got a good team in my situation in this case got a good management team yes I'm part of that management team but I'm also on the outside throwing stuff in saying have we thought of this have we thought of that one of the questions that we have from the group that are out there listening is you know the challenge of managing an organization's reputation for the long term and not falling to this transparent pin spin process that we are see our governments falling into on a regular basis especially during a time of crisis I mean what's what's your advice in terms of how do you how do you manage that like very very fine balance between it being spin but it being a believable story that everyone's gonna can understand and can relate to how do you well I'm going to give you a an answer that you probably thinks a bit ho hum but I actually don't get this spin thing I really don't deal in it and I it's not a practiced answer but I don't actually deal in spin and there's no need to call me in if that's what you want because usually I've done I'm with the client like some often I get called in the middle of a crisis I've never met them before but then they stay on as a client and we start building plans and getting them involved in some sort of strategy so they don't get in that trouble but often clients like the one that I've just been referring to I've had as a client for a long time and been involved in helping them with getting their own crisis plans and those sorts of things so one is aware of what the company's objective is and what its values are and they're not just you know stock standard 80s type you know sayings of value it's actually something that I mean you'd have it in your business too that people live and breathe and if you as an advisor know what those values are and keep an keep an eye on those when you're in a crisis and help the management team keep those to the front then I think you won't need to go down that spin thing yeah because you you know why you're there and you know what your purpose is thanks thanks thanks for that it's got in terms of questions on this particular case study that's okay do you have any questions for gentlemen at all on this particular case study any any product is which is a product that where the purchaser has put faith in you it's the same sort of thing when you're actually saying here purchase this and you can drink it or you can give it to your five-day-old baby and you can trust me for that's a whole extraordinary relationship to have and it's very very complex if we look at what's occurred in China over the last couple of years you know there's a couple of me and people crossing the border into Hong Kong every day to go and buy the infant baby for me because they can't trust the product that they can buy in China that's pretty an enormous amount of stress in Hong Kong itself and that's you know when it comes to our children it is it is a very you know from a parent's perspective it's it's a deep concern love that we have for them and you know it's you know we'll do anything to basically protect their safety and well-being and I can well understand it's a complex matter to go through. Well can I just say that's why the current crisis that's happening in New Zealand where this ghastly person has threatened the entire industry and it's not just infant formula quite frankly if this person is crazy enough to threaten infant formula he or she's crazy enough to threat it could be bananas next or whatever but that is why I've been impressed being involved in that crisis because every company not just the company that I represent has you has extremely good testing all the way through their process that's that's a given where the weaknesses are sort of when they leave the factory and in the supermarkets and how does one how does one always protect something that's on a shelf or you know you supermarkets do the best they can with all sorts of protocols in place and CCTV footage and guards and all that stuff but at the end of the day we can't actually protect everything can we? But the general public don't understand all those processes behind it and with the power of social media it can be leaked that now there's a threat how does that get quashed and so people believe that you know this infant formula is safe because it wouldn't take much for a mother to be worried. No it doesn't understandably so. No it doesn't and in that situation in the one that I've just been referring to in the 1080 one the Prime Minister gave the statements and talked about how he had faith and he and his team had investigated the manufacturing process and were quite sure that those processes were safe so you know you have people at that level talk about that there are all sorts of security provisions in place and people can be as confident as that they ever can be that things are there to try and thwart anyone getting anywhere near the product. If anything it's probably safer now than it ever was but and most products are. The social media thing when you talk about quashing I don't think you can quash anything really I just don't understand how that could ever happen it'll come out sooner or later and I think the fear of social media is something is another thing that we can talk about later but for me one doesn't need to be so afraid of social media it's another channel of communication it's not like we had to have special plans when television came in or when radio came in when they say we've got this other thing called social media well what are you talking about Facebook you know Twitter what else your blogs what what else do we why is there such a mystery about it one of the questions from our audience and this one's from Stephanie she asked in terms of care care infant form of the first case day that we're talking about did the company already have a call centre or was it set up at short notice to meet the crisis no the company does have a call centre it has what's called a care line and I've said in that care line many a time where they have very experienced usually maternal nurses who answer all sorts of questions from mothers about feeding or whatever with their babies and in this situation those care line women worked 24 seven what happened was that the care line was tooled up so more people were on it I have to say that even the MD was on the care line at some stage or they all the management team did turns on the care line one bit just to make sure that the calls were answered but also help them get a feeling of what the people were thinking and and you know where what sort of messaging was working and whether or not we were we were helping people or or not and was the company and your company scripting answers for the call centre or were you just allowing the dialogue to occur between the nurses and the consumers for that process this this both there are some standard questions that one can anticipate you know what were the batch numbers for any situation there are only a few batches that were at risk so what are the batch numbers what do I look for those sorts of things you know how did this occur why you know the who what when where and why is that they're the questions and answers that can be scripted but one would never want to get in the way of those conversations that the maternal nurses have with the mothers because they were you know fantastic really and that's really what the company is about is communicating and standing by mums to help look after their their babies yeah but I mean if there's two very very different case studies there one is there was an actual contamination of infant baby formula and the other second no there wasn't no that was it what happened was that this is where it gets complicated the the base powder the people who supplied the base powder to volunteer took done on nutrition who make carry care believed that their product was contaminated the testing at carry care was that it wasn't but nonetheless because they believed it and their testing showed that it that it was we went ahead with it of course weeks later it turned out that their tests were wrong they got false positives and the carry care tests were always right it's nice to be right in hindsight but nonetheless a great deal of damage was caused not to mention the frustration to parents and in this second case there's a there's a threat from someone to go and actually do something but not actually do it they haven't actually done anything at this point in time so there was no evidence to show that something no no no it's just a threat and so that they're two very very different in terms of advising a CEO in terms of a perceived threat as opposed to something that which was a little bit evidence-based because the supplier was saying that there was a contamination a possible contamination there how would you advise a CEO in terms of dealing with something that's just a perceived threat compared to an actual crisis I mean they're both crisis one things of Marshall McLuhan that perception is reality but they're not that much different what was different in the second case this is that the recent 1080 threat is that there are so many other authorities involved so this is a this actually a criminal matter so my client is just one of many companies that are potentially threatened this person hasn't actually named which brand he or she will target anything like that so this is actually a criminal matter and what company can't really do much but leave it to be in the hands of the experts and be guided by them and the authorities in this case the Ministry of Primary Industries in New Zealand who are handling this with the police so I mean the challenge one of the questions that we have from from our audience is that in crisis it is there's not a great deal of calm or the perception is that there isn't a great deal of calm what's your advice in terms of tips to try and stay calm in that very chaotic type of environment when there is a team dealing with a crisis matter it sounds quite basic but it's actually deep breaths constantly reminding people what the reality is not going off on to what might happen but what has happened and and just dealing with the issue at the moment not planning too far ahead but also and there are some basic things making sure everybody's well-fed seriously making sure that there is some some pizzas happening and people aren't operating on bad food and not enough sleep there was one in one crisis that I've been in the human resources manager took it on herself quite rightly to make to go out and buy pajamas toothbrushes shaving kits all of those things because people are actually sleeping in the boardrooms what that was the nature of that crisis so it's often those basic things so how do how does one stay calm you just have to train yourself you really have to train yourself to be calm and and sometimes the adrenaline and it gets too exciting and it can people can actually feed off all of that so you do need somebody who just says guys it's chill on this and and sometimes step out of the boardroom where where the action is happening and have separate conversations just to remind it to our audience that if you do have any questions on the play on the bottom right hand corner there's a button called ask questions so please send any any questions through Scott from a sporing perspective I mean it's it's a little bit more complicated that you've got this you know what's their crisis is occurring on a regular basis on the sporting domain mainly because of the insatiable need for us consumers and supporters of that sport to understand what's going on with our players there's this human element that you know at the end of the day you know what in any other organization may be a HR type human issue not of that significance but because they're in the limelight of the media are the players themselves it becomes bigger than been her I mean how does your organization deal with those types of challenges true it's it's usually a similar problem each time so there's a lot of processes around that so our usual player issue usually it's late at night in a licensed venue involving alcohol and usually there's a legal issue so we don't usually have the team ready to go in and assist but we have a great team on field but we also have a great team off field and the processes in place around that ensure that the player is also looked after that there is a structure in place that you know you've got a liais with the governing body which is obviously the NRL obviously there will the usually is a legal issue so the players welfare legally but also mentally has to be looked after and and at the club we do have a welfare and education department to make sure but you also do need to to feed the the media as well but that's where you just need to be transparent and honest but also to a level of what you know because sometimes you cannot display too much because there can be pending court cases that sometimes you cannot go too far or give too much information because it is unfair let's let's not forget these players they're young men that they're thrust into the limelight week in week out their work environment is scrutinized far afield by anyone who's on Twitter in social media week in and week out so and when they make a mistake socially they are ridiculed for it quite significantly we've had players that have heterocopters over their house for days on end when they've made a mistake in a social field for what is best termed as a misdemeanor which is certainly not condoned by the club but if anyone in this panel it happened to do it it would not even make a paper so we've got to make sure that the players welfare is protected first and foremost I mean the psychological impact on a young man you know in the early 20s of being vilified in the press for a minor misdemeanor on top of which you know there may be a small fine from from the police associated with but but the repercussions from an earnings perspective on the club finds missed opportunities in terms of games that they haven't made could be incredibly significant and I mean how do you help how do you help those players in crisis because they are in crisis now they've got a small misdemeanor they're in crisis because their world has changed significantly quite completely and they're under psychological duress what do you do to help support those type of players in through that process the players welfare is the most critical thing for the club so we do have a welfare and education department that has a number of employees and a psychologist so the players we don't only meet with the player we will meet with their parents we meet with the players manager they're monitored during the crisis and even down to the little things so if the media is camped out the front we make sure there's another avenue for the players to come into the offices so they don't have to walk through the media scrutiny every day which you know like which would be not a comfortable way to go into so but throughout the crisis we've got to be up front with the media we've got to make sure that there is a process that we go through but we we always put the players welfare first and foremost and we try to be as fair and equitable with everyone thanks thanks Scott Natalia asked the question and her questions are what are the key steps for CEO to take to scope out the crisis so the response is proportionate to the crisis itself or the issue at hand Jacqueline do you want to have a oh the key steps well let's assume that you have a crisis plan and that you have followed that plan to who it is that you talk to and who has responsibility sometimes the CEO doesn't actually have to be involved until sometimes when I get caught into something it's actually an issue more than it's a crisis and sometimes I find that sometimes CEOs get called in before they actually need to be it could have been handled at some other manage part of the management structure so one of the steps I think the steps that the CEO needs to always do is is test what has been put to him or her about what the situation is quickly grasp what that situation is and then work out what whether or not it's easily resolved or whether it is going to go on for some time and that of course you know gosh there's so many different things that can make up a crisis so without knowing the detail of that question I'm not sure I can actually give a really valuable answer here I just think that so long as you've got a management team that has tested its crisis plan and has engaged as many people without going too silly that it trusts as possible to be able to give them some advice I think that's actually a good a good stage to go through if the CEO meets regularly with his or her management team they will then have a fair idea of what's brewing usually when I've been involved in something it's an issue that's probably been around for some time and if some people had have been talking outside the little tight little cocoon of the management structure they might have been aware of that and that's not to say you know a contamination gosh knows that can happen anytime and you you wouldn't know about it but there are some things I mean you must have in your area you've said that most of your crises are very fit young men going out too late at night probably having far too much to drink and being a bit silly you've no doubt prepared for that and no doubt know this this sort of process to go through in order to be able to effectively deal with it and I think that's what happens when you know your own industry you know your own your own company you've got a fair understanding of what's likely to happen and what can go wrong so in terms of I know large corporates you know they do a fair amount of role-playing in terms of trying to work out where competitive pressures are coming from but also where unplanned crisis might come from and how you might react to those types of crisis yeah do you do a lot of work with your clients we've role-playing in for an unplanned crisis and what they might be and have a potential number of different risks that need to be managed through yeah we do do that and you can actually do you know set aside four hours or a day where you take take the you know some of the management team the senior parts of the team through that and that's I think that's very effective and one should companies should do that not every company can actually afford it or have the time to do it so sometimes I think it's also valuable to meet with your advisor sort of speaking for myself here but you know meet with other people who can challenge you and who and I've got clients like that where I meet with the CEO for a cup of tea every fortnight and just say what have you thought about this and I was at a function and so on so said that and this in my view could affect your industry so it's those sorts of conversations I think that are also really important there's not just one thing one can do and I suppose if I've ever got a message it's about really being in touch because when you're in when you're in your little zone your world is really important and often you don't even read the newspaper you don't even get clippings so you don't even see where those stories fit in the national or international narrative so having people around you who can actually take whatever world you're in and put it in the national discussion and say you know you could actually be affected by this and then get you thinking I think that's that's really valuable thank you we might go back and touch upon that social media question that we raised earlier I do have a question from Tom Hadley and he runs a professional services engineering business and he divorces his business from a social media perspective that the only the only media that he uses is linked in because of the perception that's a professional forum and he makes no reference at all to his business in Facebook or other social media in terms of your advice from businesses in terms of what they do with social media and how interactive should they be and especially in that management of a crisis and being at the front foot of it what's your advice on that look I think you I think I was trying to say probably very badly earlier that I think there's too much mystery around social media it is just another tool and you do have to it is a tool of communication that one has to be aware of and and use it well I don't think you should lie awake at night and worry too much about somebody's just tweeted something terribly about me you know I have tweaked egg I put on my desk all the time and there are a few issues that I'm following and often there's only the same five or six boring old souls who are tweeting the same thing that's not and I don't want to be too flippant about it but I do think you do have to engage I think if you have a product that has a wide appeal has a big audience and people want to give you feedback and you've got a page where you do actually have people chatting away I think you've got to got to think about that and be responsive but you don't have to you don't have to over engineer it to you know to use was Mr Hadley's engineering but but you do have to have competent people who are responsive who've got something to say who don't worry if somebody's saying bad things about you and and you know basically writing what one is to write on toilet walls writing on on your blog I don't think you have to worry too much we do have to actually have to deal with some other things that are being said and you can you can just be quite rigid about it and disciplined about it and there are very good advisors out there but but don't think it's too spooky and too mysterious to follow on we we are heavily involved on the senior rooster side of the business Facebook about over 160,000 followers Twitter is over 40,000 followers and and all club statements will go on there whether whether good or bad obviously with with crisis management we do post them on there as well we do have a lot of comments either positive or negative especially if like how we lose a player or that people and we sign a player either people are positive or negative so it is quite an open forum for us yeah but it is a very passionate business as well for us look it can be so useful and but if you if you're going to make the decision as you have done to go out there and make it as another tool to communicate with your passionate supporters or customers or whoever they are then you've got to take the good with the bad and you can't freak out too much whenever somebody said something rather nasty about you at the same time you can't be too flippant about it sounds like you guys have got a lot to tell oh there's there's always something happening no I think the challenge from a social media perspective is that that Facebook profile from a corporate perspective it's it's similar a bit like a barbecue barbecue type conversation rather than a business type conversation if you elect to be part of the conversation you need to be active in it I recollect early 2003 I think there was a website called whirlpool.net which was a couple of hundred thousand software engineers involved in it and when I started engine I was very active on whirlpool and we've got our first two thousand clients from that particular forum but after a year we got incredibly busy with work and I became inactive on that particular forum and we appointed employees to get engaged with that particular forum and this is well before social media was coined as a term but we had a bit of a backlash from that particular client said that Ilka was involved Ilka was engaged we're talking to the CEO why is he not spending time with us on every every evening and and that became a bit of a challenge that you know once you get an expectation you need to maintain that expectation. I agree with you but that also could be a writing issue yes see I mean I have invisibly nameless but I have worked with some very high profile people who the audience would believe he or she is talking to them all the time and they're not they've got some good writers who know the values that this person wants to impart knows the story and can continue that conversation so it it doesn't it might in your situation might have just been you just had some writers that might have needed to a few little lessons on how to how to be you. No no well we I think we elected that they would be that their own name in their own right. I see and they wanted you. Of course and the challenge was that they would they're representing the company in their name not not acting as me on behalf of the company so we took a fairly I guess a honest view in terms of our relationship with our clients and and so it took but the demands once you do start down that pathway to become a communicator within a channel the demands are quite quite high from a time perspective and as businesses grow rapidly it's hard to kind of balance that that time you only have 70 hours in a day and and it becomes all-consuming from a communications perspective so the social media side I think it's incredibly important but you need to invest in it and if you don't invest in it then don't do it. But don't be afraid of it either. Absolutely not. Tell people who are scared of it and I really wish they wouldn't be because it can be quite a useful tool. Oh no no no and if there's a problem you usually find that the supporters on your social media site will come up there in your defense and you don't they they will very very quickly help sort out some of the communication challenges that you have so you get a balanced conversation coming through but every now and then you have a little spot fire but I wouldn't lose any sleep over those spot fires basically. Yeah I agree with you. Okay just I'm aware of the time we have 10 minutes to go so if you do have any questions please hit that ask a question button on the bottom right hand corner of the player. Just very quickly we did we haven't spoken about the reputational impact of a mismanaged crisis and you know one crisis recent crisis comes to mind I suppose in the very issue. Do you want to maybe give some thoughts about that particular crisis and how you manage that reputational impact? I don't want to talk about that particular crisis because I don't know enough about it. I've been dealing with other crises to know too much about it. My heart goes out to everybody involved though because it's a tough one when you have you know a food that has been labelled the cause of terrible illnesses in people. So let's not let's not go there because we don't know I don't know the facts but what can I say about mismanaged crisis? If I look at some of the crises that I have been involved in and you look back and think how would I've done these differently often I think I've observed some some people who have gone out and spoken without having the facts and have I suppose gone against their better judgment I often say trust that little voice inside yourself because usually it is right if it feels doesn't feel right don't go there. I'm pleased to say I haven't actually been involved in any mismanaged crisis. It's very self-serving isn't it? But what can one learn from that? I think what as I said earlier what you can learn from any crisis is you get to know your own company really well and you get to test your own values and you get to test your management team. So I think you can even from a mismanaged crisis you can learn from that and I have had anecdotes where people have come into me and said my company went through this and we'll never go through that again well there's a good learning for you and we're going to make sure we don't go through that again and we're going to make sure that we're really well trained for anything that comes. So I think you know I think there's a lot of good to happen and people shouldn't just want to dive under the dooners when it all goes wrong although I absolutely understand the the need to want to want to do that. I mean you were talking about some of your players who where things have been handled really badly some of them just can never recover and that's that's a tragedy when when people's lives get so drowned by the crisis that they are in that they never ever come out of it and the same thing can happen with a company. And that's where the player welfare management is the most important thing in the game today because the scrutiny on the on the player has never been greater with mobile phones and cameras. It's their scrutinized 24-7. I told you a lesson that happened to me though it brings to your social media story earlier but I was looking after a very big crisis for a client and he was a rather you know stuffy he won't mind me saying this stuffy sort of old Atonian chap and he didn't believe in all this silliness about social media and all this stuff and so the crisis was happening and there aren't a great deal of scrutiny but he decided he was actually going to go on holiday and he was going to go to this rather very famous sporting match sporting event and I said I know you're not and he was like of course I am look I just cannot bear the thought of you on the front page in the front row this rather celebrate sporting event oh he said nobody will know I'm no one knows anything about me no one knows me so I went back to my office and I googled his name and lo and behold what came up was his mate who was equally stuffy but a little bit more savvy was on a world cruise and he was blogging and he was saying oh I can't wait to meet my friend Joe blow at the XYZ sporting event next month in this team if I can find this out the photographers can too so let's let's not go to that sporting event and he and he didn't but he said he still we bump into each other occasionally and he still talks about that and he says that was the big learning from him from him that he really had to be careful about every every bit the way that he behaved during that crisis and how it could easily have been twisted and you can imagine couldn't you this terrible crisis is happening and there he is quaffing champagne in some rather grand event it just would never have looked good not that he could have done much anyway everyone needs to holiday is that poor fellow said in the in the oil oh you know in the oil dispute where the oil sorry where the oil accident happened and he said I want my life back I mean my goodness if only he could be eating those words yeah so I'm going to talk a lot about what to do in a crisis as a CEO what are the things not to do in a crisis well not to say those things like I want my life back when everybody else is suffering a great deal more than you are I think that's about it it's about being it's about perspective it's not really about you particularly if you've got a consumer good where people have actually suffered or or been greatly put out because of something that's going on so it is to to try as much as possible to empathize with the others in your situation with young men I suppose it's again trying to get them to think about the effect that their silly behavior has had on whoever it was that they were silly to and to the club as well empathize obviously not ignore it as you said don't go under the doing this but also the the quickest one I've ever been experiencing was the the recent one we had in the lease club where it was reported that someone was found in our fire stairs where it wasn't our fire stairs but we didn't ignore it we investigated it and when we found it wasn't our fire stairs our media manager was straight onto it and let it be known that it wasn't our fire stairs and was redirected elsewhere so we're on the front foot yeah I think that's right if this is if there's something wrong out there about your company fix it make sure that people know that they have made a mistake so one of the last questions we have is is about delivering how best to deliver bad news and Tom also asked in terms of he's experienced an outplacement consultant is that management doesn't handle delivering bad news very well especially when when you're going to make a large number of layoffs in an organization what's your advice in terms of delivering that news and this is to an internal audience rather than to an external audience I think you just have to be truly honest you know the old saying never kid a kidder and again I can't emphasize this too much but please remember it's not about you even though it's really uncomfortable to deliver that bad news think about the person who's receiving it don't use silly jargon and waffly old sentences sometimes I've seen I've read some statements where people are laying off quite a lot of people and they've taken forever to get to the to the the real story and it's quite insulting to whoever you're delivering that message to to want to waffle on respect them and be honest Scott totally agree they're the statements that they need to be short and sharp and honest that there's no waffling on thanks thanks Scott we're getting close to our time I might just do a very quick just wrap up of our conversation today you know the key points that are coming through each crisis is different you have to acknowledge the suffering in that that acknowledge in the suffering is actually comes is in line with the World Health Organization and the Red Cross on what they have protocols for managing major crisis around the world and one of their one of their initial comments that you need to do is reduce initial stress so a lot of what we've talked about today is quite aligned with what our major service organizations do in a global perspective don't you know don't be pushed to do a conference when it's not required you know trust the team around you it's not just about one person communicating it is a team response and that team does move down all the way through to your core center environment your frontline staff that are responding to your to the crisis and you know look after your staff look after the people that are involved in the process that they need support through that you know they've got current needs that need to be met and you know they need to cope with the crisis themselves in their own manner so being empathetic to you to your staff needs and and very much from leadership perspective you know remaining calm he's key and that's in from a management perspective managing that calm through you know deep breaths and preparing yourself adequately before you do go out there and speak publicly whether that's internally or externally and and making sure that you know having that honest conversation being empathetic through that process and having that real conversation with people out there that people understand where you're coming from and how you're dealing with this particular crisis as a business and and being honest with it having great advisers along I think I mean when I've always used PR and crisis management people to help us in the businesses that I've run and I think having a good team around you is absolutely imperative to do that so I'd like to thank both Jacqueline and Scott for your time this afternoon it's been absolutely wonderful and thank you very much for the audience for your participation today hopefully you all got something out of it and we'll see you next time thank you great pleasure thank you