From time to time, the public is assailed with the details of a corporate scandal. While this may make good fodder for the media, it has the potential to permanently damage a corporate brand, so badly in fact, that the business can no longer continue profitably–or continue at all.This, in turn, may affect employees, shareholders and even the community within which the entity is located. Enter Lisa Ann Joseph.
"Crises hit all the time. But how consumers or the stakeholders relate to you as an organisation, moving forward, depends on how you manage the situation and how you deal with it in its initial stage. If your initial response is defensive, nonchalant, non reactive, or hands off, that will impact your reputation. It also determines how much damage control you will have to do later on."
Joseph would know. For seven years, she has been the managing director of Reputation Management Caribbean (RMC), providing corporations with the training to handle difficult moments or intervening directly to provide solutions at those times.
"Reputation management is what builds credibility and what allows you to able to sell and market your product and services. If your organisation doesn't have a good reputation, people are not going to come and purchase your products and services."It is a heavy responsibility for Joseph and her clients, which include major financial and energy corporations.
Which is why she took the time in her chat with the Sunday BG to dispel myths, many aspirants to careers in the communications industry have. The first is that it is all about how you look. While Joseph conceded that members of the public often fixated on the public spokespeople of companies and that it was important to be professional in appearance, it was no less vital to have the accompanying skills. One of these is getting clear messages across.
"I have seen many spokespersons, who are fully capable of delivering the message and don't have that glitzy look."Another is having a flair for dealing with people."You have to understand how people think."The communications professional also said potential entrants must also be able to think on their feet and make a lifelong commitment to learning in an ever-evolving field.Joseph herself has acquired much of her training in the trenches, having two decades of experience.
Before opening her own firm, Joseph worked as the corporate communications manager at energy giant bpTT. She has also held communications roles at Coca Cola, Trinidad Cement Ltd, First Citizens Bank and the Family Planning Association.In all that time, Joseph said she preferred to work behind the scenes and not at the forefront–another communications myth dispelled.
"I have always been a backroom, background person. The best PR people that you have ever encountered are people in the background, because we are there to advise, coach, support and put the right people in the organisation in front. Whether this is in front of a camera, in front of a meeting or in front of a conference."However, she said behind the scenes does not mean with sinister purpose.
Joseph observed that the term "public relations" has been tainted, as people have come to associate it with spin doctoring and propaganda.Among professionals, the term "corporate communications" is favoured and, under this umbrella, Joseph said reputation and crisis management are only now getting the attention they need among T&T firms.She said often companies have the attitude that they will "wing it" whenever serious problems occur.
Joseph said nine out of ten companies have what is called a business continuity plan, which allows operations to continue in the event of a crisis, but no accompanying crisis communications plan."In a society like ours, they tend to feel, 'I know how Trinis think. I know we have a seven-day wonder, a nine-day wonder.'"She said, however, the lack of clear communication in a crisis leads to ambiguity which, in turn, leads the public to speculate, filling in the blanks themselves.
She said she trains her clients using scenarios of things that could possibly go wrong and then assists them in creating contingencies.Part of this is having consistent messaging."Therefore what happens in a crisis situation, the message I am giving to the media, will be the same message that human resource is giving to families that are affected, and it is the same message that the marketing people will be giving to suppliers."
Media training is another. Joseph's firm also helps those in companies, whose job it is to interface with media.Those hoping to enter the field better prepare for long hours and impromptu phone calls. Joseph said she has had as little as an hour's notice to attend meetings with clients and has pulled all-nighters putting together press releases and other documents to facilitate clients' who made the request only the afternoon before.
The industry is also a competitive one, but Joseph said she is not worried by this, given her commitment to improving her skillset and her considerable background in the arena. Her decision to focus on a niche area like reputation and crisis communications, while working across several industries also gives her an advantage.
"In order to have an agency with companies over several industries, you have to be able to have worked with and understand the industries in order to serve them. I've worked in the financial industry. I've worked in energy, so I can relate to people who work in energy."According to Joseph, this was deliberate. She has an associate degree in journalism, which she said she took in order to understand media as a stakeholder better.
She has a bachelor's degree in social science and a master's in small and medium enterprise and not, in communications. This, she said, was to improve her ability to run a business, something she said she always wanted to do, coming from a business owning family herself.She operates another business–The Home Store–with her husband, Dale Rudder.
Making the contrast between that business which sells decorative items for the home and her communications firm, Joseph said the start-up costs for RMC were significantly lower.The consultancy was started out of her home with some of her first clients being some of the companies she worked for previously. At this point, she incurred minimal costs to prepare portfolio materials for the business.
As her client list grew, however, she hired an administrative person, who also worked from home initially until she realised the consultancy had outgrown her home. It moved to the Hotel Normandie and then to her current Fitt Street, Woodbrook location.Her staff has also grown, with a core staff of three to six who work virtually, through Skype, telephone and e-mail. These are largely freelance and contract and she said, the number can go up or down according to the project.