Most organisations view their crises as though they were caused by an external shock. They see them as the result of negative news, a leak, a decision that was publicly questioned, or a statement that provoked a harsher response than anticipated. The explanation of what happened is usually framed in these terms: something happened, it went wrong, and it forced us to react. This is understandable, because every crisis has a visible trigger. However, it is also an incomplete interpretation. Why? Because a crisis never strikes a vacuum, but rather an organisation that was already communicating in a certain way, maintaining – or failing to maintain – a degree of consistency between what it said, what it did and what it was prepared to stand up for. What pressure does is not invent that system, but put it to the test.
Two organisations may face a similar problem yet experience very different outcomes. This is not because one was luckier than the other, but because one had a more sophisticated communication system in place than the other.
When an organisation claims that the crisis took it by surprise, it is often not merely describing the sudden emergence of the problem. It is addressing something more uncomfortable: that it did not have a structure robust enough to withstand pressure without losing clarity, legitimacy and standing. Thus, the crisis ceases to be an isolated incident: it is the result of the increased intensity of the existing communication system.
What a crisis reveals about the communication system
Under normal circumstances, many structural weaknesses remain hidden. An organisation can operate for years with a certain degree of ambiguity in its messaging, with differences between departments, with spokespersons speaking from different perspectives, or with a growing gap between what the company projects and what it actually stands for. As long as there is no tension, all of this may seem manageable. It may even be mistaken for flexibility, dynamism or simple organisational complexity.
The crisis shatters that illusion of stability. It forces people to take a stand when there is no longer any room for manoeuvre. Suddenly, things that previously coexisted without too much trouble begin to clash. This is where the crisis acts as a stress test. It tests the quality of the previous system: whether there was a clear framework, whether there was a recognisable position, whether the spokespersons were aligned, whether the organisation knew from what standpoint it was speaking, and whether there was continuity between internal and external communication.
When that is in place, the crisis does not disappear, but it can be weathered without the position collapsing. When it is not, any tactical response is already at a structural disadvantage.
That is why the underlying problem rarely lies in the specific phrase that was uttered, the exact sequence of events during a hearing, or the document that went missing in the early hours. All of that matters, but it belongs to a later stage. Before the execution lies the framework that makes coherent implementation possible. The crisis does not create that framework in a negative sense. Rather, it reveals the extent to which it was absent or weakened.
Looking at a crisis in this way also shifts the focus of the question. Rather than dwelling solely on what happened that day, it forces us to ask what had happened before that day that made the response so fragile.
The cracks that pressure brings to light
1. When there is no existing discursive framework
One of the most common weaknesses is the lack of a pre-established framework for discourse. The organisation operates, communicates, makes public appearances and takes decisions, but it has not established with sufficient clarity the perspective from which it interprets sensitive issues that may challenge it. It has a patchwork of messages, campaigns, corporate communications and partial stances, but lacks a consistent rationale that would make it clear what it is prepared to stand by when tensions rise.
While conditions are favourable, this shortcoming may go unnoticed. The problem arises when a crisis strikes and the organisation needs to formulate its response in real time, under intense scrutiny and without sufficiently established internal guidelines.
When a company has not defined in advance how to interpret certain conflicts, which tensions it considers key, or which lines it does not wish to cross, the pressure forces it to improvise. The result is rarely a coherent message, but rather a series of defensive adjustments. Each new reaction attempts to correct the previous one; each intervention opens up an interpretation that must then be qualified; and the sense of improvisation stems not only from the urgency of the moment. It stems from a prior indecision that the crisis makes impossible to conceal.
At times like these, we tend to think the problem is a lack of time. But often that is not the case. What is lacking is not a shortage of hours, but rather a framework within which those hours can be organised. An organisation without a pre-established conceptual framework enters a crisis because it had not sufficiently decided what it thought of itself and from what perspective it wished to explain itself when reality ceased to be comfortable. It is the same structural problem that describes the invisible cost of fragmented communication: when there is no pre-existing system, any response is already at a disadvantage.
2. When what is said on the outside no longer matches what is happening on the inside
Another common rift arises when the organisation’s public rhetoric and the reality experienced internally have been drifting apart for some time, even though the organisation has chosen to turn a blind eye to it. The company talks about culture, purpose, responsibility, approachability and transparency, but those who work within it, collaborate with it or depend on its decisions experience something quite different. As long as nothing happens, this disconnect can be masked by a certain semblance of normality. It becomes part of the everyday background noise and, as a result, tends to be taken for granted.
A crisis brings that disconnect into sharp relief. What had previously seemed like a tolerable contradiction suddenly becomes clear to others. A labour dispute, a business decision, a public controversy or poor reputation management do not merely spark a conversation about the specific incident. They also spark a conversation about the credibility of everything that has gone before.
That is one of the reasons why some crises cause more damage than expected. The trigger may be relatively minor, but it strikes an organisation whose cohesion had already been eroded. In that context, the initial problem is no longer seen as an exception. The crisis appears to be proof that something had been amiss for some time.
That is why it is not enough to correct the public narrative when the time comes. If the organisation’s external message was not underpinned by an internal reality that was even remotely consistent with it, the crisis will always find fuel to grow. Reputational damage is amplified not only by what happens, but by what the event allows us to infer about the organisation. And few things erode credibility more quickly than the feeling that the conflict has merely exposed a deeper, long-standing inconsistency.
3. When an organisation speaks with many voices
Many organisations have capable leaders, well-prepared spokespersons and teams able to speak confidently in a variety of contexts. The problem does not arise because people cannot speak; it arises when everyone speaks solely from the perspective of their own role.
Under normal circumstances, such fragmentation may even appear to be a strength. The company presents itself as diverse and nuanced, with the ability to adapt its message to different audiences. The problem lies not in the variety of voices, but in the absence of an institutional stance that makes that variety clear. When that overarching level of coherence is lacking, each spokesperson fills the void with their own priorities.
In a crisis, this lack of coordination ceases to be a mere annoyance and becomes a public issue. The result is not just confusion; it is a loss of trust. Because an organisation fails to convey a sense of stability when every new voice seems to be interpreting the problem from a different perspective.
That is why the selection of spokespersons should never be viewed as merely a matter of presentation or training. Before preparing spokespersons, we must establish the criteria they must adhere to. When such criteria do not exist, spokespersons are out of step because they represent an organisation that has not yet fully decided how it wishes to be perceived. This is what we explore in depth in ‘The Spokesperson as a Strategic Asset’: first the framework, then the training.
Preparation is about building a framework
Aquí conviene hacer una distinción que muchas organizaciones no formulan con claridad. Una cosa es la preparación táctica y otra, muy distinta, la preparación estructural. La primera tiene que ver con protocolos, árboles de decisión, comités, manuales, simulacros, secuencias de activación y plantillas de respuesta. Todo eso es útil y, en determinados contextos, imprescindible. Pero no agota el sentido de estar preparado.
Structural preparation begins long before a crisis strikes. It requires building a communication system capable of withstanding increased pressure before a crisis arises. This involves managing corporate messaging, ensuring clarity over who has the authority to set the institutional framework, integrating communication into the decision-making process, establishing clear positions on sensitive issues, maintaining consistency between internal and external communications, and having spokespersons who understand the company’s perspective.
To put it another way: whilst a protocol dictates the response, an architecture ensures that response is credible. The protocol allocates functions, whilst the architecture prevents each function from going in a different direction. The manual reduces operational improvisation, but the underlying system prevents conceptual improvisation.
That is why preparing for a crisis should not be reduced to simply producing documentation or reviewing scenarios. Preparing for a crisis means recognising that it falls within the same realm as strategic communication, not in a separate compartment that is only activated once the problem is already on the table.
Managing the crisis before it happens
After a crisis, many organisations focus on whether the response was quick enough, whether the spokesperson spoke out in good time, whether the committee functioned effectively, or whether the message could have been worded better. The truly useful question, however, is a different one: what does this crisis tell us about how we were communicating before it broke?
This shift in focus is important because it moves the learning process from the tactical to the structural level. It helps us to view the crisis not as the result of a bad day at the office, but as a revelation.
Organisations that focus solely on tactical learning improve their ability to react, but remain vulnerable. Unless they address the weaknesses that the crisis has exposed, the next crisis will once again reveal the same underlying problem.
That is the most uncomfortable lesson, but also the most useful. External setbacks cannot always be avoided. Mistakes, conflicts and adverse circumstances are part and parcel of life for any organisation operating in the public eye. What can be decided in advance, however, is whether, when the time comes, the crisis will encounter a structure capable of absorbing it or a vacuum that will make everything worse. The difference between the two hinges on the quality of the communication system the organisation has managed to build.
