Seton Canada cares an awful lot about the people who buy from them, enough that they wanted to create a magazine and video series that would help their customers better protect their workers. Check out the Job Safety magazine, featuring advice from top safety experts and watch the latest fun video about choosing signs all shot in 1950′s industrial training video style…

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Nobody wants to plan for a crisis. It’s human nature to put crisis communication planning to the bottom of the already oh too busy to do list. But don’t.

I have written about what goes into a good crisis communications plan. And that advice still stands. But sometime after you’ve gotten your head wrapped around the concept, you will ask:

Um, where to start?

My advice: start with the thing that scares you the most. You learn a lot about yourself and vulnerability when you look the thing you don’t want to look at square in the eye.

For charities, we sometimes like to start with issues around ethical and legal breaches. Theft accusations, like those  that the now former Executive Directors of the Toronto and Ottawa’s Salvation Army offices are facing (they have been charged but nothing has been proven in a court of law), strike terror into the hearts of many a charity worker — and no wonder. They can undo years or even generations of trust built with a donating public. And no one wants to think that their colleagues could be capable of such a breach.

With the makers of a product, we sometime work with them to think through how their crisis communications would unfold around an injury or death resulting from the use of it.

With a start-up, we help them think through what they would do and say if the money dried up and they were staring bankruptcy in the face.

It is not that we enjoy torturing people. My gut twists right alongside theirs when we go through the exercise. But helping a client face their deepest fears is useful  on a number of levels:

1. It makes the potential crisis more real. When it is more real, when you have to think about how you will tell the various publics about a crisis and respond to their needs, you can sometimes find vulnerabilities you didn’t find before in the more dispassionate business plan. You might even discover a safeguard to prevent against the crisis.
2. Fear can be a powerful motivator — but only if you find ways of constructively using it. If a start-up client refuses to look at potential crisis, running out of money, by way of example, it indicates to us that they are perhaps lacking the emotional maturity they need to take their business to the next level. They may be less likely to be able to effectively think creatively to prevent financial crisis or collapse because the fear owns them and not the other way around.
3. If you can’t look your fear in the eye, it will own you. Want to know the most effective way of dealing with fear? It’s not what most people do. Most people think it’s to muscle through it and pretend it isn’t there. But it only makes things worse. Nope, the best way to deal with nerves is to acknowledge them, maybe even admit publicly to having them. When you can honestly live in your fear, it no longer controls you.

What is the thing that scares you most? What’s the thing that would shame or mortify you the most if, on behalf of your company or organization you had to stand up in front in front of cameras and microphones surrounded by journalists, bloggers, and micro-bloggers and disclose it?

Spend a bit of time twisting it with it and the painful or humbling conversations you might have to have with your most affected publics. Don’t put anything down in your plan until you have felt that little lump of fear in the back of your throat.

It’s your crisis communications plan and you can start wherever you like. I like to start with the thing that might just give us that added incentive to avoid the crisis in the first place.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Robert Land Academy Scarlet uniforms

Some boys need more structure than the world is inclined to give them. Some have ADHD, ADD or other learning disabilities. Others have struggled academically, or with drugs and alcohol. Some get in trouble with the law.

The Robert Land Academy is a military themed school, the only one of its kind in Canada. It accepts boys from around the world, many of whom have not found success in the usual school models. It is not for troubled boys and it is not a correctional facility. They aren’t the least bit interested in shaping the next generation of soldier.

What they do is provide the structure that some boys need in order to be successful.

How successful? For years now, every boy who has chosen to apply for university has been accepted to his first choice school. How many schools can say that?

We met some of the boys and their families while at the school to make this testimonial video by Filter Studios.  These boys knocked our socks off. Some had been on a dark path before coming to RLA and using their time their to become the young men they’d always hoped to be.

What impressed us was the gratitude these boys showed, to the school, but also to their parents. They understood it wasn’t easy for their parents to keep believing in them, often when others had stopped. “Thank you for not giving up on me,” was something we heard more than once from boys to the families who helped them find their way to a better life.

This video is the first of a few that will be coming out about the school.

What a place. What a story.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

As digital technology is breaking old business models, it is also enabling new forms of participation in our culture, economy and governance. Perhaps most importantly, it’s connecting Canadians as never before. Public media organizations have a mandate to serve citizens, and this puts them in a unique position to add value and opportunity in this period of change.

The CBC is in the process of conducting a major strategic review both internally and through outside regulators. The question is, who will shape the CBC of the future?

We think Canadians should. To add your idea to the forum, please visit Reimagine CBC. Be part of the conversation over what the next generation of television and public broadcasting should look like. Join notable Canadians and everyday citizens embracing a whole world of possibilities in the digital age.

In Vancouver? Come be part of the Reimagine CBC event on May 7.

Celebrating CBC: Past, Present and Future

The best way for the CBC to thrive is to build a community of supporters who have a true sense of ownership over the organization. To this end, as part of a national campaign led by media advocacy groups Open Media and Lead Now, Gen Why Media is bringing together seasoned professionals, up-and-coming CBC talent, outside experts, media innovators, and citizens in a celebratory event that will add new energy to the CBC and help articulate a fresh vision for public media.

EVENT DETAILS:

DATE: May 7th, 2012 |
TIME: 7pm (sharp) – 10pm (doors open at 6 PM)
VENUE: The Vogue Theatre
TICKETS: http://www.voguetheatre.com/detail.php?id=275

PROGRAM:

>>Opening Performance: Intercultural performance that showcases Canada’s diverse talent, cultural innovation, and artistic excellence.

>>Storytelling: Three cultural creators tell stories about their lives as Canadians, and how the CBC has been pivotal to their goals, careers and understanding of their country.

Stories from:
Christine McAvoy (local music blogger and photographer)
Ivan Coyote (writer, storyteller, performer)
Wade Davis (author, anthropologist, National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence)

>>Dialogue: On-stage “living room conversations” where participants reflect on the CBC and progressive media platforms, asking questions such as – How do we imagine the future of Canadian media? How will the CBC grow over the next 75 years? What areas for growth, change, transformation, and innovation could it pursue? What ideas or models could inspire its next generation of work?

Participants:
Jarrett Martineau (independent cultural producer)
Kathleen Cross (Professor at SFU School of Communications)
Sean Devlin (of Shit Harper Did)
Steve Pratt (Director of CBC Radio 3)
Nettie Wild (acclaimed documentary filmmaker)

>>Closing Performance: Local Super Group of indie musicians. Performances by: Dan Mangan, Aidan Knight, Hannah Epperson, Zachary Gray (of the Zolas).

SPONSORS:

Vancity
Canadian Media Guild
Canadian Media Producers Association
OpenMedia.ca
Simon Fraser Student Society
SFU Department of Humanities
SFU School of Communications
The Georgia Straight
Xtra
The Tyee
The Vancouver Observer
rabble.ca
Scene in the Dark
Poetry is Dead
CiTR
Ricepaper Magazine
Net Tuesday
Yelp

Learn more about the campaign here: www.reimaginecbc.ca

***Note: Please tell the government to keep Canada connected by maintaining support for the CBC here: http://reimaginecbc.ca/connected

Reimagine CBC Celebration is a collaborative of OpenMedia.ca, Leadnow and Gen Why Media.

OpenMedia.ca is a grassroots organization that safeguards the possibilities of the Internet. More at http://openmedia.ca/

Leadnow is an independent community that brings generations of Canadians together for progress through democracy. More at http://leadnow.ca/

Gen Why Media is a production group that uses media, events, intergenerational dialogue and public art to re-imagine civic engagement. More at http://genwhymedia.ca/

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Recently, I had the opportunity to sit on a panel with Jameson Berkow from The National Post and Amanda George from Sysomos and Marketwire. The panel was produced by a group of graduate students in the PR and Communications program at Seneca@York and was all about crisis communications in the era of Social Media.

It was a fascinating discussion, and a well rounded panel with varying but complimentary perspectives on the issue. But what impressed me most was the students. Engaged, smart and full of questions, many also expressed a vision of the world that left me hopeful. Under the capable leadership of their teacher, David Turnbull, APR, they seem to understand that with great PR comes great responsibility, and honesty and what is in the public interest trumps this quarter’s profits.

The connectivity that is the essence of the digital age is sweeping aside those who work in secrecy and spin. These students seem well ahead of the curve, and appear poised to do the profession proud when they graduate.

My thanks to everyone, especially the organizing committee and Lindsey Phelan, who was gracious beyond belief, depsite the fact that I’m sure I tried everyone’s patience by getting deeply and profoundly lost.

Thank you to David Turnbull for including me, and to turning out such a fine next generation of PR practitioners.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.