Evluating Crisis Communications: Jet Blue's Way -- RL

The chapter on evaluating risk communication efforts seems a bit like stating the obvious. But sometimes the obvious is just what it needs and it can be helpful to have a checklist of steps to follow and a guideline to which once can refer. However, like anything else in the communications profession – time and often money is of the essence, so I think it is important to be precise about exactly what one chooses to evaluate.

It was a no-brainer for Jet Blue to figure out what it needed to do to abate ill-will toward the company after the recent spate of flight delays that left passengers stranded on planes for as long as eight hours. Not many happy campers there, and in fact one unhappy customer started a blog: http://jetbluehostage.blogspot.com/ It’s still getting hits. But Jet Blue evaluated the effectiveness (or lack of effectiveness) of its communication plan early on in this crisis and took immediate action by proposing its own passenger bill of rights and sending no other than its CEO David Neeleman to speak for the company on all the top network talks shows. And Jet Blue has kept Neeleman in the fore, letting passengers know that the situation is being followed and monitored from the top. In other words, Jet blue opted for instant evaluation and instant action – something that was called for in this case and which may save the company’s reputation.

The latest posting on Jet Blue’s website:

March 20, 2007 - CEO David Neeleman updates customers on what actions JetBlue has taken since Feb. 20, and how the airline performed over the March 16 winter storm weekend.

There’s a video that goes along with this as well.

Why do I bring this up here as a commentary on a chapter that has to do with risk crisis evaluation? To stress the point – in my view – that it is not always necessary or even wise to sit around too long to ponder and pontificate on the next course of action or inaction. Jet Blue’s evaluation was clearly based around their correctly perceived analysis that the need was to act quickly – but wisely in a consumer friendly way.

This they did, and did quite well. Look at the first few words, again taken from their website introducing their customer Bill of Rights:

Above all else, JetBlue Airways is dedicated to bringing humanity back to air travel. We strive to make every part of your experience as simple and as pleasant as possible. Unfortunately, there are times when things do not go as planned. If you’re inconvenienced as a result, we think it is important that you know exactly what you can expect from us. That’s why we created our Customer Bill of Rights. …

Simple, direct and conveys to me as the consumer that if I do have a (future) unpleasant experience with JetBlue, it will be handled differently than in the past. How effective this plan has been will likely be the subject of further evaluation by JetBlue in the months ahead – but my point here is they did not get so bogged down in trying to figure out what to do about what went wrong that they failed to do anything. And inaction in the face of uncertainty can be one of the downsides of (over) evaluation and measurement.

There’s been a great deal of emphasis these days on measurement and evaluation as part of the effort by the public relations profession in general to prove and demonstrate its worth. So much so, that it has spawned a whole new branch of research in the field – both professionally and academically. I am aware that the public relations profession is engaged in a great battle to demonstrate the worth of the profession to those in the executive suite and measurement and evaluation can help the case along. However, in my view this is sometimes overdone with more resources given over to the measurement and evaluation process than the actual event or endeavor which itself is the subject of scrutiny. This is not to say that I don’t think evaluation and measurement has a value – but to an extent. Sometimes what is obvious can be treated as the obvious without going into a whole procedure to demonstrate that what is obviously so is indeed obviously so.