There are very few places where I have worked or consulted that didn’t already have a crisis communications plan in place.

The problem is that no one actually used them. My experience has been that even locating a copy of an existing crisis communications plan can be a problem at many organizations. No one reviews the plan once it’s been written. So no one remembers where it is. Often the plan has been ignored for so long that no one even recalls what it looks like. (Pro Hint: If you’re looking for yours, it’s probably a 3-ring binder, stored on a shelf somewhere in the Communications department, covered in dust.)

When the plan is finally located, it’s inevitably out of date. Phone numbers for key contacts aren’t valid any longer. Org charts are full of old information featuring people who left the organization years ago.

When I first start working with a new client, everyone gets a little embarrassed by this. We dig out the old plan. Everyone laughs a bit uncomfortably. Then people start pointing fingers and saying things like “The finance department was supposed to keep this updated!” Or “Our last consultant didn’t do his job!”

My reaction?

Don’t worry about it.

Here’s why:

Once an organization has written and distributed a crisis communications plan, it triggers a sort of complacency. People check “crisis plan” off their to-do list and assume that they’re prepared. They lose the sense of urgency that precipitated the creation of the crisis communications plan in the first place. And that’s dangerous.

Realizing that your plan is out of date and useless thus becomes good news. It reintroduces the sense of urgency that is crucial in getting an organization to prepare for a crisis.

In fact, I believe that the most important reason to create a crisis communications plan in the first place isn’t because you’re actually going to use it, it’s because the act of creating one forces people to actually think about crises. The plan itself isn’t all that valuable. The value is in becoming an organization that actively thinks and talks about what can go wrong and how to prepare for it.

In other words, writing a crisis communications plan is a way to help people at your organization become the sort of folks who can foresee trouble and respond appropriately.

The plan itself — that thing in the 3-ring binder — isn’t all that useful.

That’s because a Crisis Communications plan is just a plan. And “no plan survives contact with the enemy.”

So it’s better to think of a crisis communications plan as a direction, or an intention, than as a template or system. It’s better to think of its creation as an exercise that builds resilience, rather than as a process that creates a list of steps to follow when a crisis hits.

Specifically, a crisis communications plan outlines the intention to

• buy time through the use of “holding statements,” i.e., short statements that can be issued rapidly when a crisis begins;

• offer assurances to internal and external stakeholders that your organization recognizes the threat posed by the crisis;

• offer assurances to stakeholders and the public that you’re taking steps appropriate to the nature of the crisis;

With that said, there are a few concrete things you should have in a 3-ring binder (and in a Google Doc or similar cloud-based system that you can access anywhere)

• A list of the members of the crisis team, their phone numbers and email addresses.

• Detailed steps to take in a predictable crisis, i.e., how to contact local media when a school run by your organization is closed due to inclement weather.

• Background documents, templates, logos, photos, one-pagers, and other supporting material to share with the press.

• A full directory of staff and key stakeholders’ phone numbers and email addresses.

• A list of key media contacts.

— by Paul Conley