How preparation in the first hour determines whether you manage a crisis or it manages you
It’s 2 p.m. on a Tuesday. An employee posts allegations about discriminatory treatment at your company on social media. Within the first few minutes, the post has 100 likes and 10 shares. By 2:30 p.m., the post has 450 likes and 30 shares, and a local reporter is calling for comment. By 3 p.m., the story is live on three news sites, and the original post has garnered more than 1,000 likes and 100 shares. By 5 p.m., your CEO is fielding calls from board members asking why they’re learning about this from the news.
Sound far-fetched? MIT researchers found that false information spreads 70% faster than true stories on social media. More troubling: a study from the University of Southern California found that just 15% of the most active social media users are responsible for spreading 30% to 40% of fake news. And the financial stakes are real: a single negative result on Google’s first page can reduce your revenue by 22%. Since the rise of social media, the impact of reputation crises on stock prices has doubled. That means a handful of people, who may have never stepped foot in your business, can shape your organization’s reputation before you’ve even gathered the facts.
The moment an incident occurs, you’re in a race against the speed of misinformation. What the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) once called a “golden hour” to establish facts and craft responses has been reduced to mere seconds by digital and social media.
The Window That Closes Before You Know It’s Open
Most leadership teams believe they have time to respond thoughtfully to a crisis – to gather facts, consult with legal, and draft careful statements. The social media age hasn’t made thoughtful responses impossible – it’s made preparation essential. When you’ve built the right systems in advance, you can deliver well-considered responses in minutes, not days.
Here’s what keeps me up at night: fewer than half of companies have formal crisis plans, and even fewer practice them with any regularity. That means when something does go wrong, teams are making it up as they go – precisely when they can least afford to.
Building Muscle Memory Before You Need It
While you can’t predict every crisis, you can build systems that work in any scenario. The organizations we work with that handle crises well share a common approach: they treat crisis readiness as an ongoing priority, not something to figure out when problems arise. These teams have clarity about who needs to be involved, basic statement templates they can adapt quickly, and regularly practice making decisions under pressure. Most importantly, they’ve established clear decision-making authority so their teams can respond immediately instead of waiting in approval chains.
This isn’t about creating a massive binder that sits on a shelf. It’s about building muscle memory for your team. The first 15 minutes are about getting the right people talking to each other. The next half hour is about understanding what happened and what needs to happen next.
By 45 minutes, you should be ready to say something – even if it’s just acknowledging the situation and committing to updates. That simple act of speaking first, of filling the information space before others do, changes everything.
The Questions Your Team Should Be Able to Answer Right Now
If something significant happened at your organization right now – a workplace incident, a product issue, an allegation on social media – could you get your core team together within 15 minutes? Do those people know they’re on that team?
Beyond the logistics, there’s a more fundamental question: does your team know what they’re allowed to say, and when? We’ve seen crises stall because everyone’s waiting for someone more senior to approve language. The most effective crisis protocols push decision-making down to the people who need to act quickly, using pre-agreed frameworks and language.
You might be thinking: “We’re not a big corporation. Nothing like this has happened to us before.” But crises don’t discriminate by company size, and the absence of past incidents isn’t protection from future ones.
Start Small, Start Now
Building first-hour readiness doesn’t have to require months of planning. Start with this: identify three likely scenarios and write down who would need to be in the room for each. That’s it. You’ve just taken the first step.
That simple exercise often reveals the complexity beneath the surface – the legal considerations, the communication hierarchies, the balance between speed and accuracy. Knowing you need a plan and building one that actually works under pressure are two very different things.
Why This Matters to Us
Let’s be honest: even with the best preparation, crises are hard. They’re stressful, unpredictable, and they test every system you have.
We’ve worked with organizations before, during, and after crises, and the pattern is consistent: those who prepared well don’t just survive the immediate situation better – they keep small issues from escalating into a crisis that threatens their reputation. When faced with a true crisis, they emerge with stronger teams and clearer processes. Meanwhile, those who didn’t prepare spend months rebuilding trust and credibility.
If you’re wondering whether your organization is truly prepared, or if you’re ready to build the kind of first-hour protocol that would let you sleep better at night, let’s talk. We’ve helped organizations across a wide spectrum of industries develop crisis readiness plans that fit their specific context and risk profile.
The first hour of a crisis will arrive whether you’re ready or not. The only question is: when it does, will you be writing the story or reading someone else’s version of it?
