Handson Training
Practicing in a safe environment
Your scripts for issue and crisis management come to life in trainings and simulations. By practicing regularly, you develop the ‘muscle memory’ that is required to successfully manage a crisis. As well as trainings, we can also bring crisis situations to life with the Handson Simulator.
The Handson trainings expand the crisis preparedness of your organization.
> Issue and crisis decision-making training
In this realistic training, we allow the participants to practice their decision-making approach to a crisis situation. On the basis of a tailor made scenario, we rehearse the (management board) meetings to settle on a strategy. The team learns to separate the main issues from the secondary issues and to deal with insufficient information and time pressure. During the exercise, the team come to a issue/crisis strategy and clarity about the core message to various stakeholders, including the media.
These trainings can be supported using the realistic practice environment of the Handson Simulator.
> Crisis communication training
Communication is essential during a crisis as to not add further strain to the relationship of trust in an organization. The crisis communication training looks into the way reliable and consistent information provision can contribute to image preservation, and how that influences the formulation of messages and information policies. We also discuss examples of coping with activists, establishing a dialogue, embracing criticism and the making of a public apology.
> Handson Simulator
The Handson Simulator provides a complete and private online practice environment that helps us bring a crisis situation to life. The simulator ‘bombards’ the participants with input from stakeholders; fictional media coverage (print, radio and television) as well as reactions on various social media platforms (eg. Twitter, Facebook and the organisations own website). Each participant has their own role and therefore only has a portion of the information; it comes down to cooperation and precise decision-making. This proven method of simulation offers employees insight into wat will be asked of them if the organization’s reputation is on the line. It gives organizations the opportunity to develop scripts or alter existing ones according to the simulated practice.
The Handson Simulator can be paired with exercises from GRIP or other disaster control teams, to make a realistic ‘media feed’ to practice with. The training can be expanded with extra exercise modules to create actual content (press releases, emails, social media posts etc.) based on executive decisions.
> Media training
Anyone who’s ever had to appear on television or give a radio interview knows that a media appearance isn’t easy. The practical exercises during a media training provide personal insight and bring to light what you should or shouldn’t do in a given situation. Aside from practicing specific situations, we also look at the unwritten rules of conduct in journalism. The interviews during the trainings are always about subjects that are relevant to the client and are practiced in varying situations. For example; radio or television interviews, press conferences and ‘ambush situations’.