What to Do When Things Go Wrong

by Frank Supovitz

  “Stadium authorities are investigating the cause of the power outage,” the subsequent NFL statement read. “We will have more information as it becomes available.”

  “Fried.” That’s how Grubman described the relay in the switchgear vault when he returned to NFL Control. He filled me in on the damaged gear and the work underway to complete the manual bus tie. Barring any unforeseen problems, it was appearing increasingly likely that we would be able to restart the game.

  I didn’t feel any better yet. The blackout itself was an unforeseen occurrence, but frankly, I could very easily foresee another unforeseen shutdown. After all, we might have been fixing only a symptom—one relay shutting down—and not the problem. If the relay was not itself defective, we may not be addressing the root cause that initiated the failure. But there was no time to launch an investigation. If we had any hope of getting the game restarted, we had to restore the power and soon.

  RECOVERY REQUIRES A RESPONSE, NOT A REACTION

  When something goes wrong, we can choose to either react or respond. A reaction is immediate and instinctive. A response can take a little bit longer because it results from the processes of judgment, thought, and reason.

  When we react, we instantly do or say something that we believe is appropriate to address the situation. If we are experienced at what we are doing, we have a reasonable chance that our reaction might be the right resolution to a problem. But then again, we may act so quickly that we haven’t had the chance to consider whether it might not be right. How many times have we reacted less than optimally to something someone said or did, and regretted that we didn’t stop for a moment, think about what we heard, and process what they meant? How might we have reasoned out a better response? Once we have reacted, it is often difficult to change direction or further refine the message.

  When we take even a brief moment to evaluate what is happening around us, we are responding rather than reacting. It doesn’t have to take a long time because when something goes wrong, we often don’t have the luxury of time. But, resisting the impulse to act reflexively when something goes wrong can help us to a better recovery, or at least, not make matters worse.

  Chris Barbieri recalls reacting far too quickly at a previous job, when one of the accounting servers at UPS (United Parcel Service) froze, as it was notorious for doing. “The fix then was to hit the ‘Big Red Button’ as we say,” he remembers. “A total reboot. That server happened to be sitting next to another server with the same chassis. The label had fallen off over time and was sitting like a dried leaf underneath. Out of complete normalcy, I just hit the power button and as my finger was feeling the spring-loaded click, I realized that the server I needed to reboot was sitting there fat and happy right next to the one I had just accosted.”

  Like a modern-day Little Dutch Boy, he kept his finger firmly pressed in place as he stretched across a nearby desk to pull a phone toward him in the other hand. The colleague that responded to his call came in to back up the files on the server that was perilously one-twitch-away from losing essential data by being powered off. During the process, Barbieri absorbed a half hour of lively real-time abuse from his teammates, which resonated for the months that followed.

  Back at NFL Control, I noticed from the corner of my eye some dim flickers of life in the dark circles of glass ringing the ceiling perimeter. Today, the Superdome field is illuminated by LED fixtures that achieve their level of full intensity the moment they are turned on. In 2013, however, the gas discharge lamps that were in common stadium use took several minutes to warm up to the full illumination required for an NFL game and an HD broadcast. The lights continued to “restrike,” bathing the players stretching and playing toss on the field in increasingly brighter light, but NFL Control remained in the dark because the Superdome operations team was cautiously and systematically restoring one circuit at a time to reduce the risk of another inadvertent shutdown. The lighting on the field finally returned to full strength 24 minutes after half the stadium was plunged into darkness, a delay lasting just 4 minutes more than Doug’s original prognostication.

  Even before power was restored to NFL Control, the intense pressure that was building to kick off the ball was coming from just about every corner of the Superdome—the teams, the officials, and the broadcasters, to name a few. The lights were coming on, the players were itching to retake the field, and with 30-second commercial spots costing $4 million at the time, no one wanted to dawdle a moment longer. The officials were anxiously waiting for word from NFL Control to tee up the ball and get things started again. We may have had lights in the booth, but I noticed that the TV monitors in the room were still a snowy gray. The security surveillance system was not booted up. It then occurred to me that there may be a great deal more things that might not be ready, and we’d better check everything out. I clapped my hands to get everyone’s attention at NFL Control.

  “Everybody listen up! This is important. We’re not going to start again until I know that everybody’s systems are up.”

  Everything that was needed for the game, and even more importantly, public safety, had to be checked and confirmed as functioning. I turned to Bill McConnell and muttered: “The most important game of the year has been dead in the water for 24 minutes. What’s a few more to get this done right?”

  After the field lighting, the press box was among the first places where power was restored. CBS coverage moved back to Nantz and Simms in the broadcast booth. At NFL Control, the broadcast feed came back first, then the video screens showing the surveillance camera feeds popped back up, one at a time. Everyone at the Superdome and watching at home was more than ready for the players to line up for the kickoff. CBS just needed a couple of minutes warning before we could start again so they could wrap up whatever they were doing and be sure they were not in a commercial break.

  The response took 10 minutes more—a total of 34 minutes since the lights went out—to test all the technology to make sure that we were ready to restart the game. If I had to, I would make that decision all over again. Let’s say we reacted and kicked off the ball without testing the game time clock and when the timekeeper pressed the button, it was frozen. The line judge’s stopwatch would have kept the official time for the rest of the game. But that is a poor substitute for the large displays in the stadium that the coaches and players depend upon for “clock management,” and the fans would not have been able to understand the progress of the game as easily. It might have been tough on the TV viewers, as well, because the little box showing the time remaining in the quarter is tied into the stadium time clock. The score clock checked out.

  If there was another score, a coach’s challenge, or any number of questionable plays on the field that required a second look, the referee would go under the hood on the sideline to review the instant replay. If the instant replay system didn’t work, the story of the game would no longer be, “Why did the lights go out?” Instead it would be, “Why didn’t they check the instant replay before starting again?” That would have been the best fodder for feeding the conspiracy theories that would later emerge. Instant replay tested just fine.

  The coach-to-quarterback radio system had to work for both teams. If one of them didn’t, the team whose system was still functional would have had theirs shut off to maintain fairness. One of them, it turned out, wasn’t working. “Let’s get it fixed before we start again,” I said over the walkie-talkie. “It’s the Super Bowl, for God’s sake.” The contractor in charge of the system worked on that while we continued to check out everything else. The play clocks, the sideline communication carts, the scoreboard control system, the press box Wi-Fi—I knew that all of them, and more that I didn’t even know about, had to be checked, and I called out to every teammate at NFL Control, covering every area of operations, one-by-one. When all reported they were ready, we alerted the officiating crew and sidelines. We threw CBS the two-minute warning to get restarted and waited for them to cue the kickoff.

 
We wouldn’t know the root cause for weeks, and I wasn’t at all comfortable that we were out of the woods. One side of the building had failed. How did we know that it wouldn’t fail again? Or, that the other side wouldn’t fail. If that occurred, it was “game over.” There were no more backup feeder cables.

  FRANK: “Doug, please tell me how we make sure that it isn’t going to happen again.”

  DOUG: “I can’t.”

  It was without a doubt the longest half of football I have ever experienced.

  22

  MANAGING THE MESSAGE

  Jeffrey B. Miller, Pennsylvania State Police Commissioner (2003 to 2008), was preparing to take the stage at the University of Maryland to address a law-enforcement luncheon when his phone began to vibrate with a rapid cascade of texts. Miller immediately excused himself, established contact with his team who were in the middle of managing an unfolding crisis at a school back in his home state, and then hitched a ride to the scene on a Maryland State Police chopper.

  Miller used every second of his trip to gather reports from the ground, manage the response, and ensure that several important procedures were being implemented. A secure perimeter had been established around the site to protect the public and the scene. Roadblocks were put in place to redirect traffic. The troopers quickly identified a suitable safe location to which to direct reporters and camera crews. The troopers had a process for these things because, unfortunately, tense, terrible things must be managed by the police all the time. They knew, from experience, what the media would demand at the scene of an incident—timely and accurate information, an authoritative spokesperson to deliver it, and a view of the scene from a safe distance. These same requirements are essential when the media show up at your place of business or at the location of something gone wrong—most often, on a much different scale, of course.

  When Miller arrived, his was not the only helicopter in the vicinity. Choppers hovered above the scene and news vans from local stations had already arrived. Miller’s team was ready to manage not only the site, but the media’s voracious appetite for up-to-second information, insights, and images. It is after an incident has begun when adequate planning, decisive leadership, empowered teammates, and a conscious understanding of what is happening to your body and mind all come together. The lesson here isn’t about how to handle a crime scene. Those of us not in law enforcement will gratefully leave the handling of these matters to skilled and capable police professionals. What we take from this example are the lessons of how the Pennsylvania State Police responded after the crisis. Their protocols on handling and disseminating information were literally battle-tested because when something happens that requires police response, it is sadly all in a day’s work, and will often become a news story of local, regional, or national importance.

  We need to have the same expectations of ourselves and of our team. Assuming no one will notice when things go wrong is just hope, pure and simple, and as we know, hope is not a strategy. Perhaps we have, thus far, only been confronted with problems that are internal, addressable, and correctable. But there is a very high probability that our luck will run out eventually. When it does, this is not the right time to start developing our communications strategy.

  You don’t have to be engaged in combating criminal activity, managing the Super Bowl, or responding to a natural disaster for members of the press to quickly collect outside your door, in your parking lot, or at a location where your company’s products or services are sold. The press may be looking for information on a recall, a complaint, a delay, an injury, an illness, or a labor dispute. Even if they don’t show up physically, the press—and your customers—can bombard you with calls, texts, e-mails, and social media posts, looking for answers and information. Time is, yet again, of the essence.

  Both Police Commissioner Jeff Miller and crisis communications expert Ivy Cohen stress the importance of getting in front of the situation; that is, taking ownership of the problem not only to manage and, if possible, solve the problem, but also to be the authoritative source of information about the issue at hand and the subsequent response. Being quick to resolve an incident is not enough. If we don’t simultaneously take charge of communicating and managing the message, the message will inevitably end up managing us. Instead of proactively establishing command, clarity, and confidence from the very start, the conversation about the problem will commence in a vacuum. Without having provided our information or insights, we will then be forced to confront and correct the misinformation and misperceptions that take root after they are virally dispersed through the press and the public. This is a much more difficult management proposition.

  The Pennsylvania State Police identified a location near the scene to distribute information to reporters. They scheduled press briefings for Miller to provide fact-based status reports on the incident, updating the group with new information and fielding questions. Speculation and rumors were identified as such. If a fact was not yet confirmed, or Miller didn’t know an answer to a question, he said so, and promised to update the group with additional information at the next briefing. The anticipated times for follow-up briefings were also announced. Miller’s protocol is exactly how we should manage and serve the media if we experience a crisis of newsworthy weightiness.

  THE BATTLE FOR TRUST

  Unfortunately, unlike the police, who are generally perceived as credible authorities when something goes wrong, the organizations we work for are not necessarily as highly regarded or perceived as trustworthy. Edelman, a global communications marketing firm, has been publishing the annual Edelman Trust Barometer for nearly two decades. This report annually evaluates public beliefs through a set of statistics referred to as the “Trust Index.” This measurement is “an average of public trust, by country, in the institutions of government, business, media, and non-governmental organizations (NGOs).” According to the 2018 Edelman Trust Barometer, less than half (48%) of those surveyed across the 28 countries trust the combination of these four institutions. Between 2017 and 2018, trust in these institutions in the United States showed the steepest decline among all nations studied, from 52 percent to 43 percent. Among the general U.S. population, trust in businesses declined 10 points from 58 percent to 48 percent; trust in government declined by 14 points, from 47 percent to 33 percent, and trust in media declined by 5 points, from 47 percent to 42 percent.

  By contrast, the 2017 Gallup poll that tracked American public trust in the police showed an average of 57 percent had “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in law enforcement, consistent with the overall average over the past 25 years. So, when Police Commissioner Miller stepped to the microphone at Nickel Mines, the public were much more likely to believe and trust his remarks than they were to trust the media outlet that aired the coverage. When your company delivers information about something that went wrong, it is being done in an environment where an average of less than one-half of the American population trusts businesses to do or to say the right things.

  Today, the lines of communication with our customers, fans, and partners are wide open and can be activated quickly thanks to the increasing penetration of social media platforms, accessible to both the media and the public. The risk of not getting truthful messages disseminated quickly is vividly illustrated by a 2018 study in the journal Science, which found that false information on Twitter “diffused significantly farther, faster, deeper, and more broadly than the truth.” How much faster? “It took the truth about six times as long as falsehood to reach 1,500 people,” according to the study. The diffusion was not spread by bots, but by actual, verified users because, as Dr. Luba Kessler wrote in Psychology Today, “made up stories simply entertain us. Like gossip, they are usually titillating and sensational, and many times they feature a clear villain we can blame.”

  Being proactive and honest with the media doesn’t mean they will tell your story only from your point of view. They will often cover the situation from multiple angles. If what
went wrong influences the opinions or affects the experiences of your customers, they will almost certainly include these perspectives in their reporting. It is important that your authentic and authoritative version is at least one of the sources on which they base their reporting. They will often ask us tough questions, and it is totally acceptable to not give them access to every fact and figure. Let them know that you will investigate, follow up, and update them, and let them know when you expect to do that.

  The media are exceptionally good at what they do. Having communications professionals on call who can help you accommodate their needs, manage the volume of calls, e-mails and texts, monitor media reports and perceptions, help draft statements, and answer questions can help you shrink response time and better navigate your response and recovery. This is equally important in managing the message for social media because people start sharing what they believe happened immediately. Although you can’t control what people are saying, you must be quick to respond before the facts are distorted and swamped by the vast amount of misinformation that could spread virulently.

  Ivy Cohen offers these rules of engagement for responding on social media, though most of these pointers are as valid for traditional media as well:

  1. Be the first out with authoritative information if you can. If you can’t be first, be quick.

  2. Take ownership over the response: “Here’s what went wrong, and here’s what we are doing about it.”

  3. Respond factually to reports and posts that are inaccurate. Deliver information you can verify to be true. Don’t offer opinions and don’t get into arguments.

  4. Be sincere, authentic, and candid.

  5. Be concise, clear, and helpful.

  6. Direct message (DM) people who have a specific complaint or want a specific response. Gather more information from them without bringing that conversation into the greater discourse.