Hard-Won Lessons and New Tools to Prepare for a Safer, Better 2021
Assess Future Risks • Lead with Purpose • Update Crisis Plans • Protect the Workplace • Return to Work • Launch New Channels
The pandemic isn't the only thing that shook us this year. From social injustice to riots, wildfires and a divisive election, we've all struggled to keep up with the latest crisis while rallying our employees and informing our audiences. This year, communicators have been leading the way in managing brand reputation, yet realize their job is never done. Another crisis could be right around the corner.
Sign up for Ragan's Crisis Communications Conference, an information-packed virtual experience where you'll hone your crisis communication skills for a better future. Together, we'll assess what was learned and forecast what to expect next—so you can protect your brand, empower employees and uplift your organization in 2021.
Purchase your registration Today.
#RaganCrisisComms
YOU'LL ALSO RECEIVE THESE EXCLUSIVE BONUS MATERIALS:
- The 5 Stages of Crisis Recovery Checklist
- The Scenario Process Worksheet
- Pre- and Post-Crisis Checklists to Prepare for Whatever Strikes Next
- Pandemics, Politics, Purpose: A New Model for Public Affairs
- Gauging Employees in Crisis: WFH Pulse Survey Template
- D&I Organizational Assessment Steps
Plus, all attendees receive:
- Access to a private LinkedIn group for attendees only
- All slides and presentations from speakers
- Connections to our esteemed speakers
Top 15 things you'll learn at this conference:
- Courageous leadership: What's expected from companies and execs post-Covid
- Building trust: How trust-based crisis communications can counter uncertainty
- CSR and DEI: Why expectations around purpose and inclusion are at an all-time high
and how to activate your commitments to avoid reputational and workplace risk
- After-action evaluation: Biggest wins and communication fails of 2020—
plus how to evaluate and elevate your current outbreak preparedness
- Risk assessment: 10 biggest threats and challenges facing your organization in 2021
- Virtual war rooms: What to do when your situation room goes digital
- Frontline training: How even internal communicators can step into the breach before
and during disasters—including leading table-top drills and drafting crisis messages
- Crisis plans re-envisioned: How to update crisis plans in the Covid-era with revised
templates and tips from execs who helped created the CDC crisis course
- Covid-19 timelines: When—and how—to inform employees of an outbreak
- Apps and channels: Best tech to engage and support employees in times of crisis
(Zoom, Slack, Teams, repurposed intranets and beyond)
- Media amid mayhem: Strategies for communicating with the press during any crisis
- Case studies: How to rethink crisis teams and tools with hard-won Covid-19 lessons
- Recovery strategies: How to guide your workforce to a more protected, productive future
- Social media and AI: How to tap listening tools to manage your reputation—and to inform employees, the public and frontline crisis responders
- What's next: How to pinpoint and prepare for future crises before they happen
Interactive Crisis Wargame: Can You Save Your Reputation in the Pandemic Era?
***When registering for the event, check the option that you’d like to also attend this Signal AI Workshop!
- Leverage cutting-edge technology to stay ahead of the story
- Work with peers to respond under pressure to a changing situation
- Test best practices theories to control the narrative
Are you tired yet? 2020 is 1918, 1929 and 1968 all rolled into one. "The future always comes too fast and in the wrong order," the futurist Alvin Toffler once wrote. His prophecy certainly hit home this year when we were all thrust into crisis roles in the face of Covid-19, social injustice, WFH challenges and political uncertainty. Nobody wants a repeat. So here's a sneak peek at the potential potholes in the road ahead.
You'll hear:
- The rise of "Mercantile Activism" and what it means for your company
- The promise and challenge of employee activism
- What the data says about the risk of cyber breaches and how to prepare
- Why there has been some #MeToo backlash and what it means for DEI
- How to revise your enterprise risk management (ERM) program
- The big solve: How to counter declining trust—and earn it back
- How to prepare execs for new challenges tied to ESG, FARA, unions and more
Covid changed communications forever. The lines between internal and external communications blurred—and everyone on your team is now a de facto crisis communicator. Join to hear how others managed the outbreak—so you can protect your organization no matter what's next.
You'll learn:
- How frequent pulse surveys and Covid digital info-packets aligned a workforce
- How "mixternal" communications can help you move quickly to get the word out
- The "Trust Toolbox": How to engage and protect deskless and WFH workers with new channels, including Microsites, Teams, CEO emails and mobile apps
- Frontline insights from the outbreak—from adding Zoom townhalls, overhauled intranets, blogs and Facebook Live to crisis playbooks
- How others updated crisis plans and response checklists to protect employees
- What healthcare execs are expecting in 2021 (and how to prepare)
Authentic, empathetic leadership communications can convey an air of calm and control in the face of the unknown—as this year proved. Join to discover how to transform your execs into trusted voices when it matters most by grounding every speech, post or email around values and purpose.
You'll learn:
- How to reframe leadership and communications roles with values and purpose
- Chief Empathy Officer: How your execs can communicate through emotions
- Chief Clarity Officer: Steps to create cadence of clear, compassionate communications
- What kind of leadership is most effective when bad news breaks
- Pivots and passions: How to handle paralysis of purpose to lead with grace
Expectations around purpose and inclusion are at an all-time high. In fact, you risk reputational and workplace crises if you haven't activated your CSR and DEI commitments in 2021. Join for a practical framework to successfully integrate your CSR and DEI—and finally move past planning to implementation.
You'll learn:
- Why CSR and DEI will matter more in 2021
- How DEI sits within CSR: Structural considerations
- How to bring DEI initiatives to life in 4 phases
- Preparing (incl. empathy building and relearning race)
- Discovering (identifying strategic gaps and needs)
- Creating (drafting your implementation plan)
- Journeying (first steps and what to expect next)
- A three-pillar assessment to kickstart inclusion
Gone are the days when the conventional wisdom for brands facing a disinformation crisis was to stay silent until it blows over for fear of fanning the flames. Join this session with Jennifer Granston, Chief Customer Officer at Zignal Labs, who will share her firsthand experience guiding brands and major media through the “infodemic” of 2020, showing you why more brand leaders today are using traditional and social media analytics to take an active-response approach to disinformation.
You'll learn:
- How comms leaders can assess whether a disinformation incident is serious enough to warrant an active response
- What kinds of media analytics can help comms professionals decide if a crisis warrants an active response
- How one Fortune 500 company responded to a high-profile disinformation issue
Consider this fast-paced panel moderated by APCO Worldwide's Eliot Hoff your chance to exorcise the worst of 2020—and extract best practices. You'll hear what communicators at top consumer brands learned from "The Year to Remember"—from handling the press and WFH employees amid crisis to leveling up your crisis response to rally teams and business in 2021.
You'll discover:
- How PR pros managed media relations amid Covid and social justice issues
- Surprising channels that kept teams and stakeholders aligned
- The convergence of value/purpose and crisis response—how an organization's
purpose is core to coming back stronger and making decisions in an authentic way - What crisis recovery means to team structure during an ongoing crisis like the pandemic
- What these brands are forecasting—and how they're drafting recovery messaging now
When a crisis hits, the effectiveness of your organization’s response depends mostly on how well you planned before bad news struck. The best crisis plans avoid pitfalls that can torpedo an effective response, leaving stakeholders disappointed and your organization’s reputation damaged. Join to hear how to fine-tune your plan to address common mistakes.
You'll learn:
- How to apply sandpaper to friction points that can trip you up when the heat is on
- The stakeholder group most crisis plans overlook—and how to ensure yours doesn't
- How to minimize the amount of work your team will do on day one of a crisis
- A crisis messaging principle that’s more important than ever
- How a simple reorientation can make your crisis plan much more effective
The war room used to be a staple of crisis communications. But even it has been turned on its head with so many team members offsite. So how do you maximize your brain power and rapid response when everyone from IT to HR and legal are remote? Join to hear how reprioritizing person-to-person (P2P) communication can help you bridge the gap—so you can accelerate and elevate your crisis response even in the WFH age.
You'll learn:
- Why P2P communication matters more in crisis planning than ever before
- How to re-think and realign your crisis plans, processes and collaboration tools for maximum empathy—and speed
- Expecting vs. reacting: How to stop chasing the crisis and finally get ahead
- The new world of "chat ops" and how to ensure instant action across channels like Teams, Slacks, Zoom, Google Hangouts and more
- Hugging your haters: What to do when comments turn to crisis
The shift to remote work has forced internal communicators to adopt new ways of communicating with a dispersed global workforce. Join Katie Liston from ContactMonkey for a case study and takeaways you can use to elevate your remote workforce outreach and engagement.
You'll learn:
- How Alnylam, the world’s leading RNAi therapeutics company is communicating with over 1400 remote employees
- How the Alnylam team has been using ContactMonkey’s survey features built into Outlook
- How to understand what type of resources employees need the most to get their job done
eCrime erupted in 2020. Cybercriminals become more brazen and ransomware quadrupled in the wake of emerging WFH vulnerabilities. The cybersecurity landscape will continue to evolve rapidly in the year ahead. Join for a breakdown of the top communication challenges of cybersecurity and hard-won lessons from this year's biggest attacks.
You'll learn:
- The top 5 PR fails of the year—and key lessons for communicators
- Trends: Biggest attacks of the year and they portend for next year
- How ransomware attacks present novel communication challenges
- Anatomy of a successful cybersecurity plan
- How to handle negotiations with perpetrators (and insurers)
- How to alert customers, the press and other stakeholders
- Policies and precautions to communicate with employees
- What to expect in 2021—and what to do if you're attacked
Sixty-three percent of Americans view disinformation as a major problem on par with gun violence (63%), according to the Institute for Public Relations Disinformation in Society Report. Join to hear more surprising findings—and what communicators can do to help combat the "infodemic."
You'll learn:
- The disinformation threats most likely to damage your reputation
- How to plan and prepare for a disinformation campaign against your brand
- Tools to mitigate disinformation—from real-time monitoring to ethics codes
- Essential steps to combat disinformation on your social media feeds
- How to pre-punk, debunk and fact-check messaging against false claims
The right message at the right time from the right person can save lives. That's according to the Crisis and Emergency Risk Communication (CERC) course taught at the CDC. Join the crisis guru who actually created that course to learn from her horror stories—so you can help your people make difficult decisions when the unthinkable happens.
You'll discover:
- Top 5 mistakes in crisis leadership communication
- How to support your leader in crisis times to avoid your own horror stories
- Essential persuasion skills for when you're on the hot seat
- CDC lessons learned: What's wrong with crisis comms plans today
- What's next: What you must know about risk assessment going into 2021
Reputation and issues management among the general public and key stakeholders is more than a challenge. It's a necessity in today's always-on world of real time communications. But what if a key stakeholder gives voice to views that put your industry or narrative at risk? Answer: Do some soul searching, rediscover a deeper purpose and create a clear, uplifting message to support your narrative. If you're successful, you could recast your narrative and turn a threat into an opportunity. Join to hear how two crisis vets did exactly that for the video game industry.
You'll learn:
- How to stop, reassess and refocus: Redefining yourself in the midst of reputation risks
- Repositioning insights and research methods to help you find "greater purpose"
- Message architecture: A proven process for message testing your new mission
- How to bet the word out about your new mission across the PESO spectrum
We'll share the top tactics and strategies from the virtual conference as you prepare to implement these ideas for your organization.
If you are interested in submitting a speaker proposal, please contact Beki Winchel at BekiW@ragan.com
WHO SHOULD ATTEND?
You should attend if you spend at least a quarter of your time in any of these areas:
Crisis communications • PR • Employee communications • Social media • Storytelling • Content marketing • Writing and editing • Media relations
| On Demand Rates | ||
|---|---|---|
| Registration | $499 | |
| Ragan Insider Registration | $399 | |
| Nonprofit Registration | $349 |
Customer service
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Thank you to our sponsors:
Join us as an event sponsor and meet your target audience, showcase your products, present thought leadership, generate leads and boost your brand.
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- Speaking sessions on our main agenda
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- Bonus breakfast sessions
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- Networking passes
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For more information on opportunities available at this specific event, reach out to HannahL@ragan.com.
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Registration
For questions related to event registrations, please contact:
Shallon Blackburn
Customer Service & Sales Manager
ShallonB@ragan.com
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If you’re interested in sponsoring this event, please contact:
Hannah Lavelle
Sales & Client Relations Manager
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Program
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Brian Pittman
Manager of Strategic Programs
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On Demand access is available for 12-months post purchase.
For questions, please contact customer service at
CService@Ragan.com or by calling 800-878-5331.
