Contributing Bloggers

Proactive Strategies To Avert Potential Disaster
January 17, 2017

Here’s what we recently learned about crisis management at the hands of Hurricane Matthew. We were on the Gulf Coast of Florida, managing a conference for a client. About 250 customers from across the Americas (Latin America, U.S. and Canada) had joined us for a three-day conference in Marco Island, Florida.

Within the span of 20 minutes, our bright, sunny setting went from this:

To this:

Staring down Hurricane Matthew’s wrath definitely caused great concern for all of us. However, we quickly adapted to the developing situation and helped put fears at ease.

Here are the tips we took away that can be applied to your risk management plans:

1. Get ahead of the churn

Before delegates could start to post concerns over Twitter and other social media channels, we put a plan in place to communicate developments.

2. Emergency meeting with the hotel

We met with the hotel leads, from events to operations and emergency response. Our meeting had two objectives:

  • Find out, if it should become necessary, what the hotel’s evacuation plans are and how they would be communicated. We were not expecting to be evacuated, but from a risk perspective we felt it important to cover all scenarios. We then focused on what our reality would be and how to manage the residual effects of the hurricane on our event.
  • We established our Plan B (and C and D) for the conference activities we had planned that might be affected. This included:
    • Moving the beach party indoors, and lunches and breaks from the terrace to inside locations.
    • Communicating to attendees to check with their airline for cancellations and, if they had to extend their stay, to check in with the hotel’s front desk.
    • Working closely with the affected departments at the hotel

A shout out to Marco Island Marriott for their professionalism and flexibility. Not only did they remain flexible as plans were changed, but they came up with more rooms to help accommodate our guests who had to extend their stay.

3. Deal with the facts

This is important in order to avoid the misrepresentation of information.

The Marriott hotel chain is a global company which deals with emergency situations on an ongoing basis. They are the experts and it was important that we listened and followed their lead because we knew they were receiving direct instructions on their situation and procedures to be followed. It wasn’t up to us to go rogue and invent new ones. They informed us they follow the National Hurricane Center and have a series of emergency procedures in place. (Yup, we saw the thick binder that outlined their procedures).

4. Have a safe base for your communications

This means a standard response that you don’t deviate from, but keep reiterating until the situation changes (if and when it does).

Here is what our communication looked like to attendees:

We are monitoring developments with the host hotel. We will follow the instructions as outlined by the hotel. The hotel receives regular updates from the National Hurricane Center. At this point in time, Marco Island is not under a watch or a warning. We will continue to update you as we receive developments.

5. The customer comes first

Remember, your customer’s experience comes first. And this means helping to navigate the unexpected and alleviating anxiety. Once we communicated the above, we also shared a slide in the general session that included an image from the National Hurricane Center on where the hurricane was tracking. We encouraged delegates to check with their airline if they would be flying to any of the affected areas upon departure. As advised by the hotel, we also instructed delegates not to check out of the hotel until they had checked with their airline. If they needed to extend their stay, visit the hotel front desk.

This would have been an entirely different post had we been in the hurricane track. But, the above procedures are ones we would recommend you have in place for any emergencies and risk management plans.

Trish Knox

Trish has been turning her clients' event vision into reality for 18 years. Known for continually pushing the envelope both strategically and creatively, she has set the bar for helping clients effectively engage with audiences. With more than 25 years in marketing, Trish's career includes a combination of both agency and client experience that proves invaluable when operating in the corporate environment. She has guided clients through some of their most sensitive and high profile programs. Trish applies a thoughtful, unique approach, while embracing new ideas and blending the latest industry trends to all event programs. She has developed event programs for leading corporations such as Avaya, Facebook, Canadian Tire, Dell, D2L, Microsoft, Salesforce and Softchoice. Her event experience crosses the corporate spectrum including the management of large scale conferences, national roadshows, trade show booth design, award galas and C-level customer engagement events. Trish works in conjunction with the client to position the company as forward thinkers and leaders in innovation.

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