Crisis Management paper.PDF

Nicholas Tancredi

Northern Arizona University

Crisis Management & Communication: A Detailed Case Study of the BP Oil Spill in 2010

POS-581

Professor Smith

Summer 2015 Semester

Crisis Management & Communication: A Detailed Case Study of the BP Oil Spill in 2010 Tancredi 2

Abstract

This paper will discuss the detailed accounts of the BP (British Petroleum) oil spill that occurred

on the Gulf of Mexico in 2010, and the drastic effects that the oil had on wildlife, the water, the

land, as well as the political and financial upset caused by BP, especially BP CEO Tony

Hayward during the time of the oil spill. This paper will illustrate the breakdown in crisis

communication, crisis management, no emergency management planning, as well as poor

strategic planning on the part of BP and Tony Hayward. Additionally, this paper will illustrate

how true the words of Yogi Berra are, when he said, "We made too many wrong mistakes"

(Corbell, 2015). Moreover, this paper will discuss the author’s views on leadership, crisis

communication, planning, and humility within public and private organizations.


The Crisis

On April 20, 2010, in the Gulf of Mexico, a BP "gas release and subsequent explosion

occurred on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig working on the Macondo exploration well for BP"

(BP, 2014). Eleven people died because of the explosion, and others were injured (BP, 2014).

"The fire burned for 36 hours before the rig sank, and hydrocarbons leaked into the Gulf of

Mexico before the well was closed and sealed" (BP, 2014). The accident involved a well

integrity failure, which was followed by a loss of hydrostatic control of the well, and was

followed by a failure to control the flow from the well with the blowout preventer (BOP)

equipment, that allowed the release and subsequent ignition of hydrocarbons (BP, 2014).

Ultimately, the BOP emergency functions failed to seal the well after the initial explosions (BP,

2014). Moreover, 50,000 barrels of oil a day or in total 780,000 meters cubed ended up polluting

and killing more than a thousand marine wildlife animals (Eastwest PR, 2012).

While the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig was a tragedy, the bigger tragedy

was the fact that BP CEO Tony Hayward acted just as if he was not liable at all, and really did

not want to be bothered with the responsibility of dealing with the press either. It was the fact

that Hayward felt so much pity for himself, by saying "What the hell did we do to deserve this"

(Owen, 2010)? It was the famous line he delivered on May 31st of 2010 stating, "I want my life

back" (Owen, 2010). Hayward also tried to deny and make the oil rig explosion seem less worse

than it was by stating on May 14th that, "The Gulf of Mexico is a very big Ocean. The amount of

volume of oil and dispersant we are putting into it is tiny in relation to the total water volume"

(Owen, 2010). He followed that up with his May 18th speech by saying, "I think the

environmental impact of this disaster is likely to be very, very modest" (Owen, 2010). He also

showed arrogance and insensitivity by saying "I'm a Brit, I can take it" (June 4th), and also on


May 31st, he stated, "I don't feel my job is on the line" (Owen, 2010). As Owen stated, “Wakey,

wakey Tony: you are not only the most reviled person in America, your job and your company is

on the line (2010).

In addition to the sloppy handling of the Deepwater Horizon rig exploding, it was also the

organizational cultural that Tony Hayward sanctioned, which consisted of extreme risk-taking,

ignoring expert advice, overlooking warnings about safety issues and hid facts as well. BP’s

failure to the disaster with sufficient speed and attention was a direct consequence of this flawed

culture (Corkindale, 2010). Additionally, from their Harvard Business Review Article, Managing

Risks: A New Framework, Kaplan and Mikes state that when Tony Hayward became CEO of BP

in 2007; he vowed to make safety his top priority. Among the new rules he put into place, were

the mandates that all employees use lids on coffee cups while walking and refrain from texting

while driving. Three years later on his watch, the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded in the Gulf

of Mexico, which caused the worst man-made disasters in history (2012). A U.S. investigation

commission attributed the disaster to management failures that crippled “the abilities of

individuals involved to identify the risks they faced and to properly evaluate, communicate, and

address them” (Kaplan and Mikes, 2012).

Management Failures & Blunders

With the vast media advisors and public relations professionals that BP has on staff, they

made the mistake of trying to spin their way out of this crisis rather than tackling it head on.

Tony Hayward should have realized, or been advised that there are some crises that cannot be

spun. Instead, Hayward has done an unknown amount of damage to BP’s reputation with his

gaffes and apparent inability to understand public reaction to his comments. He appeared weak,

petty, defensive and lacking a grip on what really going on with the situation. It was not


surprisingly that he moved aside to make way for Chairman Carl-Henric Svanberg, whose

seriousness is unquestionable, but who also appears equally clueless in the spotlight (Corkindale,

2010).

The blunders of BP echo the same blunders of the financial CEO’s in 2008 that

bankrupted their companies, laid off thousands of employees, and almost killed the economy. In

the 2011 film Margin Call, many employees of an unnamed US investment bank are laid off

during the 2008 financial crisis. One of those employees is Eric Dale, portrayed by Stanley Tucci.

Eric Dale, a senior risk analyst who has been working on some troubling figures is let go from

the company, and suggests to one of his employees that he look into the figures a little more.

Eventually, his employee Peter Sullivan, portrayed by Zachary Quinto, discovers that the

company is losing money fast, and could be bankrupt very quick (Chandor, 2011). The CEO of

the company John Tuld, portrayed by Jeremy Irons, has a survival-of-the fittest mentality, and

will do whatever it takes to save himself and his enormous wealth (The Shed Online, 2012).

However, while Tuld seems confident when he makes his screen appearance, it’s only after an

emergency meeting in the middle of night with senior employees trying to put together a plan to

save the company, his employees do not see eye-to-eye with what Tuld wants to do. Eventually,

Tuld becomes nervous and his stress level rises. He ultimately gets his way, and his employees

spend the day selling bad shares and stocks just to try and stay in business (Chandor, 2011). This

is the same kind of mentally that Tony Hayward embodied. He plays it tough on the outside by

saying "I'm a Brit, I can take it", to saying, “I want my life back” (Owen, 2010). This is

essentially John Tuld in a nutshell.

Moreover, people that are in power may feel like they are high and mighty for quite

sometime. Although, when something does not go their way, panic sets in, and their “high and


mighty” mentality goes away real quick. In some of the same contexts to Margin Call (2011), the

2010 Australian thriller, Wasted on the Young, actor Oliver Ackland portrays Darren, who is

considered “the nerd” by most including his “cool brother” Zack, portrayed by Alex Russell,

rapes a fellow student Xandrie, portrayed by Adelaide Clemens at a high school party one night.

As the story goes on, Darren and Xandrie are seen as friends, and in one scene of the movie,

Zack has his friends beat up Darren, and many students at the school just stand and watch. Zack

says to Darren while he is on the floor after a bad beating, “When you’re really far above people,

you don’t have to explain yourself to anyone for anything” (Lucas, 2010). The mentality of Tony

Hayward and John Tuld is clearly seen here. In the next scene Xandrie is seen pointing a gun at

Zack, but he does not her seriously. He makes her feel bad enough that she kills herself in front

of a large crowd of students at the school. At the end of the film, Darren gets revenge on his

brother for what he did to him and Xandrie. He ties his brother up, points a gun at his head,

records what he is doing live, and broadcasts it to students at party, and lets them decide on what

should happen to Zack (Lucas, 2010). Essentially, Darren is letting “the media” make the

decision as it “normally” does on various criminal cases, as well as other cases relating to riots

and rebellion against police as seen in the news lately. Although in the case of what Darren does

to Zack, Darren acts as “the media” that exposed BP CEO Tony Hayward for what he really is; a

coward. This just goes to show that most of the time, the villain does not win, even if Hollywood

depicts that the villain wins, or is applauded by the audience. In the case of Tony Hayward, he

did not win in the eyes if the public, residents of New Orleans and Louisiana, or the United

States.

Dr. Peter Drucker once quoted, “Arrogance is being proud of ignorance” (Corbell, 2015).

Obviously, this was not meant for the BP oil spill public relations debacle. The results of this


debacle go down in a case study for worst practices in crisis management. BP did not realize it,

but they created a PR situation synonymous with herding cats. BP had to clear up two problems

– its oil mess and tarnished image (Corbell, 2015). Even with all its efforts, BP was not in the

eye of the media, and when it had been, it was not a pretty picture. BP offered $5,000 to potential

plaintiffs not to litigate in anticipated lawsuits (Corbell, 2015). BP has neither been seen as

compassionate or aware of their social responsibility, nor did BP either “appear to roll up the

proverbial sleeves to work with government to minimize the ecological damage” (Corbell, 2015).

It is apparent that BP CEO Tony Hayward did not take the oil spill as seriously as he

should have. In responding to a question about BP’s safety record in an interview with ABC’s

George Stephanopoulos, Tony Hayward stated, “I think we’ve made enormous strides as a

company in the last three or four years with a remorseless focus on safe, reliable operations, Ah,

this wasn’t our accident. This was a drilling rig operated by another company. It was their

people, their systems, their processes. We are responsible not for the accident but we are

responsible for the oil, dealing with it and cleaning the situation up” (Corbell, 2015). Again,

Hayward is shifting the blame on another company. Yes, it was the other company’s people,

systems, and processes, but shifting blame at a time when people lost their lives, water life was

polluted, the Gulf of Mexico was drenched in oil, this was not the time for Tony Hayward to

make himself look good. As Thomas Paine said once, “These are the times that try men's souls”

(Goodreads, 2015), and Tony Hayward did not pull through for BP, or for the rest of the United

States. He was put to the test and failed horribly.

The problem with Tony Hayward was that he did want to be bothered with putting a

“battle-tested” crisis management or crisis communication together. Relying on crisis

management plans that would not work for a mass scale event such as the Deepwater Horizon


explosion and oil spill is acting irresponsibly. When discussing the management of strategy risks,

Kaplan and Mikes state that, “Each approach requires quite different structures and roles for a

risk-management function, but all three encourage employees to challenge existing assumptions

and debate risk information” (2012). They also state that “one size does not fit all”, and runs

counter to the efforts of regulatory authorities, as well as professional associations to standardize

the function (Kaplan & Mikes, 2012). In addition to a “one size does not fit all” issue, the chief

danger from putting risk managers in line with the rest of the organization is that they become

more of deal makers, rather than deal questioners (Kaplan & Mikes, 2012). Essentially, keep

crisis and risk managers separate from being part of the “general management”; they have a very

specialized job. This is what BP Executives and CEO Tony Hayward really had to focus on.

Formulating a Crisis Communication Plan

Crisis communication was defined by many researchers in various ways, and is related to

managing the outcome, impact, and public perception of a crisis (De Wolf & Mejri, 2013, p. 49).

Crisis communication has also been defined as an organization’s response to a crisis situation in

an attempt to lower the damage to the corporate image, and can be summarized as a process of

information collection, information processing, decision making, and information distribution of

data needed as a necessary component to address a crisis situation to both internal and external

stakeholders (De Wolf & Mejri, 2013, p. 49). Additionally, in current day, risks are now very

high during and after a crisis occurs and crisis images, stories and spreading information tend to

move faster and faster. This is especially true, because “BP’s oil spill occurred in the world of

24/7 news, blogs, tweets, status updates and niche-media” (Mulkern, 2010). Crisis

communication nowadays plays a central role in effective crisis management and has increased

in importance in the last decades (De Wolf & Mejri, 2013, p. 49). As Bob Kenney, principal at


Context Marketing, a consulting firm that advises on consumer behavior states, “Its so

immediate today. To read the blogs, the visual imagery is much stronger and more frequent and

unrelenting” (Mulkern, 2010). How true!

In establishing an effective crisis communication plan, an organization must take a few

things in mind when putting together a plan. These tips are a part of crisis communications

checklist, which is something that I can agree with, because of my experience working with

social media as Marketing and Public Relations Chair at Barry University as an inductee of Delta

Epsilon Iota (DEI) Honor Society, as well as the college where I received my Bachelor’s Degree

in Public Administration. They consist of: (1) Accept and Involve Stakeholders as Legitimate

Partners, (2) Listen to People, (3) Be Truthful, Honest, Frank, and Open, (4) Coordinate,

Collaborate, and Partner with Other Credible Sources, (5) Meet the Needs of the Media, (6)

Communicate Clearly and with Compassion and (7) Plan Thoroughly and Carefully (De Wolf &

Mejri, 2013, p. 50).

There are also ten additional steps to implement as well. The first seven steps mentioned

should be undertaken before the crisis occurs. These ten steps can be used within the

organization, and consist of: “(1) Identifying the crisis communications team, (2) Identifying the

spokespersons, (3) Spokespersons Training, (4) Establishing notification systems, (5) Identifying

and knowing stakeholders, (6) Anticipating crises, (7) Developing holding statements, (8)

Assessing the crisis situation, (9) Identifying key messages and (10) Riding out the storm” (De

Wolf & Mejri, 2013, pp. 50-51).

De Wolf & Mejri state that, “It is clear that BP has not prepared a crisis communication

plan. As a matter of fact, the former BP CEO Tony Hayward recognized in an interview to a

Money Program on BBC 2 that “BP’s contingency plans were inadequate” and that BP “was not


prepared” for the Gulf oil disaster and “was making it up day to day” in early stages” (De Wolf

& Mejri, 2013, p. 52). Hayward also stated that BP was not prepared to deal with the media

scrutiny over the Deepwater oil disaster, and felt that he had been “demonized an vilified” (De

Wolf & Mejri, 2013, p. 52).

If Tony Hayward and BP executives had just started to take some time day-to-day to

prepare a crisis management and communication plan in the event of a large scale emergency

such as the Deepwater oil disaster, the situation would still be bad, but not to the extent that it

came to be by not having any organized contingency, crisis, communication, or management

plan. Again, I state that as someone who has experience using social media professionally, it

would not be hard for me to come up with a crisis communication plan that would “save the face”

of BP, if I was a role such as a Crisis Communication Manager position. At least I would be

someone who has the knowledge, skills, and abilities to coordinate a mass communication plan,

and along with my writing ability, I would also have been able to write up a press release and

internal notification to internal BP employees letting them know about the current situation, and

what needs to be done concerning the oil spill cleanup. As Dr. Peter Drucker stated, “Leadership

is lifting a person’s vision to high sights, the raising of a person’s performance to a higher

standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations” (Kruse, 2012). This is

such a true statement, seeing that BP employees had no one to raise their vision, performance, or

even personality. If the executive climate is downtrodden, the overall company climate will be

downtrodden as well, and that is sad, especially for a large company such as BP.

My Thoughts as a Leader

From the 1776 pamphlet series American Crisis, Thomas Paine quoted, “I love the man

that smiles at trouble: that can gather strength from distress, and grow brave by reflection”


(Goodread, 2015). I like to think that in a crisis situation, I would be able to pull that strength

together to remain calm in face of criticism, media bashing, as well as the uncertainty of my

fellow employees. I will say that when I first started as a Medical Photography Intern at the

Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) in West Palm Beach, Florida, I was the type of person who

did not want to “get out of his shell.” I did not want to work with other people in the sense of

having to interact with patients as I had to for my internship. However, as time went on, I “came

out of my shell”, and started to become friendlier with the patients, and saw that if I treated them

like human-beings, they really were receptive, especially if I started conversation with them;

photography was often the subject of our conversations, because most patients were impressed

by the photography studio, and would share their own stories about photography.

I started at the VA at a troubling time. I started in March of 2014, and two months into

my internship, the VA scandal broke on the news stating that forty patients had died at the

Phoenix VA. I read the news articles, watched media reports online, and heard the lies about VA

employees, knowing first hand how hard VA employees worked, seeing the long hours they put

in, only to care for the men and women that fought for our country. It was the portrait painted by

news media that made it sound as if VA employees did not care about patients, that they were

lazy, incompetent, and distracted. These lies were all untrue about every single employee that

worked at the VA, but when something in an organization goes wrong, the whole organization

looks bad, but when leadership and organized crisis communication planning is in affect, those

emergency planning methods could trump those lies, and could literally “shut the media up” if

those in charge possess the bravery, writing skills, and “people skills” to divert the lies

perpetrated by the news media. The VA still lives by the words of President Abraham Lincoln

today, “To care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow, and his orphan” (U.S.


Department of Veterans Affairs), and yes, the VA also lives by the words, and will always live by the

words outside each VA Hospital, The Price of Freedom is Visible Here

(U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs). Leadership may change and dwindle, but good people will always

go above and beyond to help one in need.

Leadership is everything in times of crisis, and while every single BP employee is

certainly not to blame, just as every VA employee was not to blame, it is essential for the

leadership heads to step-up during these difficult times, and put hope back into the organization.

Tony Hayward did not step-up, nor did he give any hope to any BP employees. He tried to divert

the problem, saying that it was not his fault. He told a news cameraman to “get out of out there”,

complaining that he “wanted his life back”, and went to watch his yacht race while oil spews into

the Gulf. Because of these actions, Hayward became the most hated man in America (De Wolf &

Mejri, 2013, p. 53). This is not how a leader acts in time of a crisis, and because he chose to act

as a coward, he has smeared BP with a large black mark that will not go away. Julius Caesar

famously quoted that, “Cowards die many times before their actual deaths” (BrainyQuote, 2015).

I am sure that Tony Hayward has “died many times” since the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and

his sloppy job of not preparing for something of this mass intensity.

The one thing I have learned, especially in a time of crisis, is to not panic, and remain

calm as a leader who can get the public, emergency employees, and well as the press and media

to over estimate the amount of damages or deaths, especially in large-scale tragedy. The person

in charge may not have all of the answers, and well, it would really hard to have all of the

answers, especially since the damage could be so bad. The September 11th 2001 attacks n the

Twin Towers, the Oklahoma City Bombing in 1995, the Columbine High School Shooting in


1999, the Massacre at Virginia Tech in 2007, and the main topic of this paper, The BP Oil Spill

in 2010.

These tragic events pushed the boundaries of leaders, where some leaders have rose up

above the call of duty, or like Tony Hayward, crumbled and cowered “in a corner.” Famous

singer and member of the Rat Pack Frank Sinatra sang a song called I Whistle a Happy Tune,

that simply means, if one does not know what they are doing in a time of crisis, act like they do,

and do not panic in times of trouble, and it goes like this: “Whenever I feel afraid, I hold my head

erect; And whistle a happy tune so no one will suspect I'm afraid; While shivering in my shoes, I

strike a careless pose; And whistle a happy tune and no one ever knows I'm afraid; The result of

this deception is very strange to tell; For when I fool the people I fear, I fool myself as well; I

whistle a happy tune, and every single time; The happiness in the tune convinces me that I'm not

afraid; Make believe you're brave, and the trick will take you far; You may as brave as you make

believe you are” (Lyrics Freak, 2015). Some may find this funny, others may say this is cliché,

but just remember these words of Ol’ Blue Eyes, and when if those of you reading this may be in

the same situation of one of the people in charge of the disasters above, just remember to whistle

a happy tune.

Crisis & Social Media Communication

As Jo Owen states in his article BP Oil Spill Crisis Management: How Not to Do it, when

faced with a disaster, there are a few simple rules to follow that consist of: Recognizing the

problem early, because denial is bad; Move to action fast: analysis and the blame game can come

later, if ever; Over-react, if necessary. Insurers know that a claim dealt with costs less than a

claim dealt with slowly. Do whatever it takes to fix the problem at hand, and show empathy with

people on the wrong end of things: don't go all introverted and play the victim card, just as BP


CEO Tony Hayward did by saying, "I want my life back." Over Communicate, especially with

the key stakeholders (2010). As Owen states, "It is staggering that a huge company in a crisis-

prone industry could handle a crisis so badly (2010). Additionally, Owen also states that much of

the blame was attached to BP CEO Tony Hayward, and the only reason for not firing him today

is so that he can take all the heat and then a new CEO can start with a clean slate. On the other

hand, his gaffes are now putting the whole business at risk, and it is time for him to go (2010).

This is of course before Hayward was replaced as BP CEO.

When it comes to a good crisis communication plan, it is always a good idea to be honest

about the problem at hand, and not try to push it to the side as BP CEO Tony Hayward did. This

oil spill became the most discussed crisis communication examples within many organizations,

especially in the education field of PR, because BP failed to answer the top three strategies of

crisis management (Eastwest PR, 2012). The three key strategies include responding to crisis

immediately, taking responsibility and solving the crisis. There are however some tips that PR

Practitioners can learn from BP’s attempt to recover from the oil spill, which include that fact

that they used social media as their main platform of interaction with the stakeholders, which

included the public and journalists. They uploaded pictures of the cleaning process and outcome

of the leakage, and also created a live feed video for stakeholders on what BP is doing to rectify

the pipes of the oilrigs that burst (Eastwest PR, 2012). Crisis PR expert Lehane also stated that,

“Being accessible is the type of thing the public does look for from a corporate entity in this type

of situation” (Eastwest PR, 2012).

It was a very good call by BP to interact with the public through a social media network

to recover from this crisis. However, even today, BP is still finding it hard to recover from the

crisis but they have learned their lesson well and are taking actions to restore their image and


reputation (Eastwest PR, 2012). The most important thing to remember in crisis management is,

“one can never plan a crisis to strike but it is important to always be prepared” (Eastwest PR,

2012).

My Crisis Communication Plan for the Deepwater Oil Spill

Ready.gov is an emergency preparedness site that gives guidance from the Department of

Homeland Security (DHS), for specific threats, such as storms, hurricanes, preparing for natural

disasters, and even manmade threats. Ready has prepared a crisis communication plan that

encompasses who the information about the crisis needs to go to, specific messages that need to

get out to specific people involved in the company or organization, as well as the resources for

crisis communication. In the case of the Deepwater Horizon explosion, BP could have simply

followed the information given on ready.gov, in order to get an idea of what they needed to be

doing to prepare for a large-scale incident such as an oil spill. If I were the CEO of BP at the

time of the oil spill, or if I was working in a PR position, I would have taken the following steps:

Contacted the proper audiences to communicate the crisis that happened, including, but not

limited to:

Customers

Survivors impacted by the incident and their families

Employees and their families

News Media

Community–especially neighbors living near the facility

Company management, directors and investors

Government elected officials, regulators and other authorities


Suppliers (list from Ready)

The next part of the crisis communications plan would consist of each audience getting

specific information about how the crisis would affect their order, job, safety, or community. I

would use script messages to communicate with each audience, which would be used to address

specific concerns about a customer’s order, such as, “When will I receive my order?” “What will

you give me to compensate for the delay” (Ready)?

Pre-scripted messages need to be prepared using information designed during the risk

assessment. The risk assessment process should identify scenarios that would require

communications with stakeholders as well. There may be various scenarios, but the need for

communications will relate more to the impacts or potential impacts of the incident:

Accidents that injure employees or others

Property damage to company facilities

Liability associated injury to or damage sustained by others

Production or service interruptions

Chemical spills or releases with potential off-site consequences, including

environmental

Product quality issues

Probably the most important part involved in crisis communications is the resources that

are necessary to do the job effectively. As someone who has worked as an intern at the

Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) in West Palm Beach, Florida, part of my job was making

sure that employees had the proper supplies that they needed, as well as ordering supplies from


the warehouse, including putting in work orders. Ready describes resources for crisis

communications, some of which that I used while working at the VA. They consist of:

Telephones with dedicated or addressable lines for incoming calls and separate lines for

outgoing calls

Access to any electronic notification system used to inform employees

Electronic mail (with access to “info@” inbox and ability to send messages)

Fax machine (one for receiving and one for sending)

Webmaster access to company website to post updates

Access to social media accounts

Access to local area network, secure remote server, message template library and printers

Hard copies of emergency response, business continuity and crisis communications plan

Site and building diagrams, information related to business related to business processes

and loss prevention programs, such as: safety and health, property loss prevention,

physical and information/cyber security, fleet safety, environmental management and

product quality

Copiers

Forms for documenting events as they unfold

Message boards (flipcharts, whiteboards, etc.)

Pens, pencils, paper, clipboards, as well as other stationary items

It was quite hard to believe that BP did not prepare any of these items for a crisis

communications plan, seeing that specific industry is constantly at risk for a crisis. At the VA, I

was a Medical Photography and Program Support Intern, where I had to know about biological


cleanup, such as using disinfectant and wearing gloves, which as described by Ready as

environmental management. I did this on the Medical Photography side, but on the Program

Support side, where I was doing more clerical work, I answered phones, directed calls, orders

office supplies, used a fax machine, sent and received emails, used a copier and printer, as well

as printed and laminated posters. This experience at the VA gave me the skills to work in a crisis

communication position as someone who orders supplies and relays messages to the proper

people.

When it comes to having access to social media accounts, I have also have experience doing

this as well, since I held a volunteer position as Marketing and Public Relations Chair for

Delta Epsilon Iota (DEI) Honor Society when I was a student at Barry University. I set up the

Linked In page, and managed the Facebook page as well. I also put a PowerPoint presentation

together for one of the DEI meetings to. Moreover, when I took Emergency Management and

Public Planning electives at Barry University, I was the PowerPoint Coordinator who was

responsible for taking the research found in my groups, and designed an organized PowerPoint

for the class project. I also designed PowerPoint presentations while I was an intern at the VA as

well, which would qualify me for being a Crisis Communications Manager at BP during the time

of the oil spill.

As a Crisis Communications Manager, I would also be able to utilize my writing skills

when posting messages about the incident on social media, including the news media,

stakeholders, and most importantly, to the people that work for me, so messages flow clearly

throughout the company. This is what BP was not doing. While they did a good job of utilizing

social media, they did a sloppy job of preparing for a major incident that would take months to


clean up and fix, and two years of paperwork and settlements. After all, take a lesson from

Benjamin Franklin, as he famously said, “Failing to plan is planning to fail” (Goodreads, 2015).

SWOT Analysis & Lean Six Sigma (What I would have done)

One very important thing to remember when trying to prevent a crisis, or problem from

arising in any organization, whether in the public or private sector is putting together a SWOT

analysis. A SWOT analysis stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. This

simply means that an organization looks at what strengths they have, what their weaknesses are,

what opportunities they have for advancement and growth, and what threats face them, and in a

crisis situation, what crisis would arise as a threat in the future. A website called strengthening

nonprofits.org specializes in crisis management and crisis response plans, states, a SWOT

analysis “is best done with a group of key employees, volunteers, or supporters of your

organization. Special attention should be paid to the weaknesses and threats you identify.

Examine those threats and weaknesses to identify which crises are most likely to confront your

organization” (strengthening nonprofits.org).

Once a list of possible crises has been put together, the group should then brainstorm

what would happen to the organization if the crisis would actually take place. The cost in terms

of money, assets, reputation or the well-being of staff, clients, and volunteers would need to be

established. How would these effects be minimized or mitigated? It is important to ask these

questions, as they will start the process of formulating a crisis response plan (strengthening

nonprofits.org). Additionally, forming a crisis management plan needs to encompass a group of

people, or team, that specializes in certain jobs and responsibilities for a crisis response plan. The

crisis management team needs to consist of:


Decision maker: For most organizations the decision maker is the default decision maker

is the executive director. It would also be a good idea to have a back-up decision maker

as well, in the event that the executive decision maker is involved with other duties

(strengthening nonprofits)

Spokesperson: This person is the face of the organization, and is responsible for

presenting careful attention to the press, as well as other public organizations

(strengthening nonprofits)

Internal Communications Manager: This individual is someone with a good sense of who

will be affected by the crisis should be accountable for making sure that the internal

communication component of the crisis management plan is executed and that staff,

volunteers, and other key players with any information they may need (strengthening

nonprofits)

A SWOT analysis would have greatly benefited BP even before the Deepwater oil rig

explosion happened. However, someone at BP was neglectful, and in turn, the crisis that

happened on April 20th turned into a disaster, and put a black mark on BP and Tony Hayward.

Dante Alighieri once said, “The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who maintain their

neutrality in times of moral crisis” (Brainy Quotes, 2015). This quote holds great truth when it

comes to how BP and Tony Hayward handled the BP oil spill. It is a real shame that a company

such as BP messed up so badly, considering the fact that they have many tools at their disposal

for this sort of crisis.

In addition to putting together a SWOT analysis as a Crisis Communications Manager for

BP, I want to leave you with something that I learned at the VA. It’s called Lean Six Sigma, and

it is being practiced by many federal agencies now, but was first developed by the private sector.


Just before the VA scandal came out in the media in May 2014, I took a White Belt class in Lean

Six Sigma given at the VA, and could see this working for BP, which would have had helped the

company in the first place.

“Lean six sigma is an approach focused on improving quality, reducing variation and

eliminating waste in an organization. It is based on the concept of combining two

improvement programmes, Six Sigma and Lean Enterprise” (Furterer & Elshennawy,

2005, p. 1179).

Lean Six Sigma can enhance the efficiency of processes, better deliver the quality of

service to citizens, as well as lower the costs of providing these services. These tools have

streamlined the processes and lowered the time to finish the financial processes (Furterer

& Elshennawy, 2005, p. 1181).

While organizing a Six Sigma initiative, one needs to be prepared to make significant

improvement in performance based on innovative thinking. Concepts of incremental

improvement must be taken out of the Lean Sigma Six plan, because having a less

innovative mindset blocks creativity, and foils any hope of a creative initiative to

transform an organization (Gupta, 2005, p. 17).

Overall, Lean Six Sigma is a tool for innovation among public and private sector organizations.

When used in an innovative fashion, Lean Six Sigma can aid public and private sector

organizations through times of crisis, disaster, and hardship. As the American Society of Quality

states, “Todays innovation leader skillfully balances all the competing demands of innovation

change initiatives: determining how much or how little structure is needed in any particular

situation or with which group of employees; knowing what tools to use in each situation, and

understanding the consequences of applying various tools and strategies in different situations;


knowing where to reach a proper balance between the blue-sky and practical; And the necessary

mix of disruptive innovation and incremental innovation” (2010, p. 6).

Essentially, a leader needs to know when to act, what is a practical decision, what

decisions they need to be making at that particular time, when their limits are, how creativity to

use at a certain time, and when to pull out, and go back to the drawing board. It is also important

to remember one thing, and this goes for any organization, but in this case, especially BP. Being

prepared is everything, and as Kaplan and Mikes state, “ A firm’s ability to weather storms

depends on how seriously executives take risk management when the sun is shining and no

clouds are on the horizon” (2012). Basically, practice all the time for a crisis or disaster to

happen; it can only be done for the situation turns into a crisis, and when force-pounding

hurricane winds are not breaking the door. My father taught me “No thought leaves the mind if a

thinker.” Prepare for everything, because some of some of the most violent acts of violence,

terrorism, and nature have happened. Again, prepare for everything!

Conclusion

This paper discussed the lack of crisis management and planning when the Deepwater oil

rig exploded on April 20, 2010 off the Gulf of Mexico, as well as the sloppy job that BP CEO

Tony Hayward did when it came to showing any concern for happened. Hayward showed

cowardice and fear when it came to showing responsibility for why the rig exploded, or why

there was not a crisis management plan in place either. The other concern raised by

communication professionals, was the fact that there was no crisis communication plan in place

for such a large scale incident, and a company as large as BP should have had one, considering

that BP is in an industry that revolves around risk. Communications Professor Timothy Sellnow

from the University of Kentucky stated, “From a public relations standpoint the story got away


from them and became one of science and became one of consistent and persistent failures”

(Mulkern, 2010). In the process, BP failed to show compassion for people early on (Mulkern,

2010), and that was mostly due to the fact that Tony Hayward was CEO at the time. A

company’s culture stems from the leadership that is in charge of the company, and given the fact

that Hayward stated multiple times that he “wanted his life back”, he chose to play the victim

card as Moneywatch author Jo Owen states (2010). When Tony Hayward stated that “he wanted

his life back”, Owen stated, “The eleven workers who were killed in the disaster would also like

their lives back please, Tony” (2010).

The second part of this research paper asked what I would do if I were in charge of a

situation similar to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and I took the part of a Crisis

Communication Manager, in which I would put my social media and writing skills to good use,

and would write up press releases and internal memos to BP employees letting them know of the

current situation, and what we are going to do about it. My experience as Marketing and Public

Relations Chair for Delta Epsilon Iota (DEI) Honor Society when I was a student at Barry

University, would help me greatly when posting updates on our social media pages, as well as

what to say to members of the press. Additionally, I would use my enhanced social skills gained

while working as a Medical Photography Intern at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), to

make the press releases that I write not sound so institutional, but make them clear enough to

reach the general public, and let them see that BP is practicing some type of humility, and not

just telling people “what they want to hear.”

The third and most important part to what I would do as Crisis Communications Manager

is communicate heavily with company executives, and emphasize that they need to show people

that they really do care by being on the “front lines” just as George Washington did when his


troops went into battle. General Washington would not them go in alone; he always led the

charge, no matter the impending danger that was ahead. Strong leadership is vital in a large-scale

crisis such as the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploding, and water that is being contaminated at

the same time. Playing the victim card or the blame game is not a wise decision, as it looks bad

in the eyes of employees, the press, the public, and most importantly, the people that are directly

affected by this tragedy, especially to the families of the eleven employees who lost their lives on

that fateful day in April.

Leadership is not a game, and neither is a stable and proven crisis communication plan,

especially in the oil and manufacturing industries where a crisis is seen on a normal basis.

University of Washington Communications Professor Kathleen Fairbanks stated, “BP never had

a plan in place for the worst case scenario or they would have put it in place. I don’t think it’s a

question of money….They absolutely don’t know what to do at all” (Mulkern, 2010). There can

be no excuse for not having a crisis communications plan in place, seeing that this is the 21st

century, and people expect information to be available at a second’s notice. Crisis management is

vital to private organizations and government agencies; I know this from working at the VA,

where in May 2014, the media was bashing the VA for the deaths of forty veterans, and made

them look like they did not know what they were doing, however, the VA had a crisis

management plan and PR people on staff; ready to put out a statement to the press. At least VA

executives did not sit by, and let the crisis progress as BP did.

While it is not easy for public or private executives, and employees for that matter to get

over a large scale crisis in a company or government agency, it is important to remember that the

situation will pass, but how it gets handled will forever be remembered. I leave the reader with a

poem by a famous Poet of Michigan Edgar Albert Guest, who in this poem says that in times of


trouble, don’t give up; keep fighting, or as the famous line goes, “Goonies never say die”

(Donner, 1985)!

See It Through – Edgar Albert Guest

“When you’re up against a trouble,

Meet it squarely, face to face;

Lift your chin and set your shoulders,

Plant your feet and take a brace.

When it’s vain to try to dodge it,

Do the best that you can do;

You may fail, but you may conquer,

See it through!

Black may be the clouds about you

And your future may seem grim,

But don’t let your nerve desert you;

Keep yourself in fighting trim.

If the worst is bound to happen,

Spite of all that you can do,

Running from it will not save you,

See it through!

Even hope may seem but futile,

When with troubles you’re beset,

But remember you are facing

Just what other men have met.

You may fail, but fall still fighting;

Don’t give up, whate’er you do;

Eyes front, head high to the finish.

See it through!”

(Poetry Foundation, 2015)


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