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The purpose of this study is to analyze the corporate social responsibility (CSR) communication of the Fortune top-100 companies during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Specifically, the authors examine the messages of international companies' CSR communication to customers during the pandemic, focusing particularly on the companies' posts on Twitter. In addition to identifying what international companies communicate, the authors determine the motives of companies' COVID-19-related CSR communication as well as how companies strategically approach CSR communication.

Using Nvivo, the authors carried out content analysis of the COVID-19-related tweets of the Fortune top-100 companies using Twitter's ‘advanced search’ tool. The analysis included tweets posted between 1 February 2020 and September 2021, a period that represents the peak of the pandemic.

Study findings indicate that COVID-19-related CSR responses of international companies are driven by commitment to organizational values, attainment of recognition for timely response to COVID-19, altruistic motives to combat COVID-19 and congruence with social movements that create expectations from customers to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. Most companies adopt a response strategy to CSR communication, by informing customers of their COVID-19 responses in relation to several issues such as alterations in companies' processes and the impacts of the pandemic on health.

The study suggests that the CSR practices of companies should be strategically embedded in organizations' international marketing plans and not remain just on-off responses to crises should marketing-related benefits be obtained. Several recommendations are made to strengthen companies' adoption of a proactive, engagement-oriented approach to CSR communication.

The CSR communication of international companies during external crises has not been sufficiently studied in relation to international marketing, as most studies considered internal corporate crises. Focusing on an external crisis (COVID-19 pandemic) with global impacts, this study advances existing knowledge on international companies' CSR communication to their customers. Additionally, this study offers new insights on the role of integrated, coordinated and consistent CSR messages and strategies, which are targeted to the needs and expectations of domestic and international customers in response to COVID-19 pandemic.

This study aims to explore public coping strategies with government-imposed lockdown restrictions (i.e. forced compliance) due to a health crisis (i.e. COVID-19). This directly impacts the public's power, as they may feel alienated from their environment and from others. Consequently, this study explores the relationships between the public's power, quality of life and crisis-coping strategies. This is important to help governments understand public discourse surrounding perceived government health crisis communication, which aids effective policy development.

An online questionnaire distributed via Qualtrics received 371 responses from the South African public and structural equation modelling was used to test the hypotheses.

The results indicate the public's experience of powerlessness and resulting information-sharing, negative word-of-mouth and support-seeking as crisis coping strategies in response to government-imposed lockdown restrictions.

The public's perspective on health crisis communication used in this study sheds light on adaptive and maladaptive coping strategies that the public employs due to the alienation they feel during a health crisis with government-forced compliance. The findings add to the sparse research on crisis communication from the public perspective in a developing country context and provide insights for governments in developing health crisis communication strategies. The results give insight into developing policies related to community engagement and citizen participation during a pandemic.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the practices of strategic crisis communication of most successful Croatian companies and the perception of these practices from the perspective of media. A framework of reactive strategies is applied to determine how Croatian companies from five major industries would communicate during crisis situations and how their communication is interpreted within the media as a group that conveys and presents their behavior and communication to the broader public.

A quantitative survey among 60 individuals in charge of communications in Croatian companies was conducted to identify which strategies they are likely to use when in crisis situations. In-depth interviews with 20 journalists regularly reporting on these companies were undertaken to determine their perception and experiences regarding how these companies would communicate during crisis situations.

Croatian companies are likely to communicate un-strategically, passively and without any risk. Journalists see the communication of the companies even more passive and reactive which seriously influences the manner they report about these companies during crisis situations.

Although 60 companies and 20 journalists both represent a significantly representative sample in Croatian terms, the study provides an insight into only Croatian corporate environment. Conducting the research in different surroundings and other countries could provide additional insight. Nevertheless, the analyzed variables that influenced the selection of strategies provide notable insight for drawing conclusions on this subject.

Besides showing how analyzed companies are likely to communicate during crises, this paper provides an insight into the media’s perception of this communication. The research has shown that the media sees their communication as more passive and reactive than it actually is, which implicates a serious need of shift in communication patterns if these companies want to strive to gain mutual understanding and remotely positive attitude from the media during crisis situations.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the communication behaviour on Twitter during the rise of a preventable corporate crisis. It aims to contribute to situational crisis response strategies, and to broaden the authors’ understanding of legitimacy management. In September 2015, Volkswagen’s (VW) emission scandal became public and caused debates also in social media. By applying complementing tools of data analysis to the Twitter communication around the “Dieselgate” crisis, this study unfolds a field of tension between corporate strategy and public perception.

The authors collected Twitter data and analysed approximately 2.1m tweets relevant to the VW crisis. The authors approached the data by separating the overall communication in peak and quiet phases; analysing the peaks with social network analysis techniques; studying sentiments and the differences in each phase; and specifically examining tweets from VW’s corporate accounts with regard to the situational crisis communication theory (SCCT) and legitimacy.

VW’s very few tweets were not able to reduce the emotionality and sentiment of the ongoing Twitter discussion. Instead, even during quiet phases, the communication remained rather negative. The analysis suggests that VW followed a strategy not covered by SCCT, i.e. keeping silent.

The discovered strategy of keeping silent extends the SCCT and is linked to legitimacy management. Learnings from this study help decision makers to put social media response strategies into practice to swiftly recover from crises or refrain from certain strategies to avoid further reputational damage.

Examining the underlying communication patterns of a crisis case with societal magnitude such as “Dieselgate” helps sensitising customers and executives to utilise social media channels more comprehensible in future crises.

The study uncovers the unconventional and yet barely addressed crisis response strategy of a global enterprise while devising unique realisations for practitioners and communication researchers. It contributes to existing knowledge about situational crisis response strategies, and broadens the authors’ understanding of legitimacy management in times of social media ubiquity.

This case study analyzes Countrywide Financial’s responses to its recent financial crisis and illustrates the use of communication theory and image restoration strategies by utilizing several crisis response frameworks. The study uses a critical analysis methodology to examine the communication strategies employed by Countrywide, a large mortgage lending company in order to attempt to restore its image. The authors look at excerpts from media stories, carefully examine the language used by company representatives in response to the banking crisis, and categorize the corporate communications into various strategies as defined in the crisis communication literature. Countrywide faced several crisis situations during the period of this study, including the subprime mortgage crisis, public criticism of its CEO’s executive compensation package, allegations of insider trading, and financial difficulties. Corporate responses are critical in determining what amount of damage is done to the firm’s image during a crisis. Countrywide responded to these situations most often using the strategies of image bolstering, reducing the credibility of its accuser, and minimizing the crisis (Benoit, 1995). Through these communications, the company attempted to appear well established and untarnished. It also criticized the media, the courts, and the regulators in an attempt to reduce their credibility. Countrywide made no deliberate attempt to admit fault or to take measures to prevent the problem from reoccurring.

This research examines how chain hotels respond to the crisis in the context of situational crisis communication, focusing on the first emergence of the COVID-19 crisis and the second period of the pandemic, during which the pandemic was relatively weak.

The data were obtained from the digital announcements shared by the world's 50 most valuable hotel chains. The announcements, declared in the two phases of March–April and July–September 2020, were analyzed. The data were collected through document analysis and transferred to the MAXQDA program for qualitative content analysis. Interviews were held with the managers of chain companies to compare and confirm the results obtained.

Chain hotels announced regulations on existing reservations, potential customers, intermediary businesses, suppliers and employees by focusing on maintaining business reputation in the first phase of the pandemic. The hotel units seem to be more open to referrals on emergency measures from chain centers in this phase. In the second stage, announcements to increase sales were shared. The content of the crisis communication is in line with the predictions advocated under the situational crisis communication theory. In addition, some applications that do not comply with the theory are also identified.

The effects of the crisis communication on hotels were addressed; the responses of other stakeholders to the communication were not taken into account.

Successful response strategies must be considered when developing future crisis preparedness measures. Actors in the hospitality industry can adopt a situational crisis communication approach as an effective strategy to cope with the losses caused by a crisis and possibly speed recovery. Hotels can turn the crisis into an opportunity with the strategies they put forward during the pandemic and gain stronger reputations after the pandemic.

This study contributes to both the crisis management literature and the literature on COVID-19 by exemplifying the crisis communication measures and strategies of chain hotels. Focusing on different sub-processes in the analysis of crisis communication, revealing the background about the production and transfer of the information shared during the crisis, and interpreting the content of the messages by considering the benefit of the stakeholders and benefits of the hotel reveals the originality of this study.

The purpose of this paper is to deal with the adaptation of communication strategies set out in the pre-crisis plan implemented by the members of Quebec’s public safety authorities in the specific case of the rail explosion and fire that destroyed the downtown of Lac-Mégantic in July 2013.

Based on a triangulation approach combining three qualitative methodologies, namely in-depth interviews, analysis of communication artifacts, and news analysis, this research aims to determine how public safety authorities used the existing crisis management plan at the time of the Lac-Mégantic crisis. It also seeks to determine whether or not the crisis managers used emergent communication strategies, as defined by Mintzberg (2007). Finally, the case study also seeks to identify potentially unforeseen contextual elements that influenced the communication strategies deployed.

The analysis reveals that the disaster, whose magnitude and consequences were unprecedented in Canada, prompted those in charge of public safety to review the established crisis management communication strategies and practices in order to adapt to the realities of a particular terrain and context. It is important to mention, first, that the crisis was managed in an unforeseen context of a twofold digital divide that created a dead zone for emergency and public health messages; and, second, that direct communication with the victims revealed major difficulty in understanding such messages (literacy). As a result, the traditional and digital communication strategies established in the crisis management plan had to be rapidly reviewed in order to incorporate “old-fashioned” communication tools, such as giving out information door-to-door, meeting with people on their front porches, and holding informal street gatherings with public health doctors and social workers to better communicate messages to the disaster victims and to promote the adoption of safe behaviors.

The findings demonstrate that in a crisis and emergency context, communication efforts must sometimes deviate from the planned strategies and come back to simple, direct, and “human” communication methods in order to adapt to the realities of the victims.

The purpose of this paper is to examine crisis communication strategies used by four leading Chinese milk companies at various crisis stages to cope with the largest food safety crisis in China. Approaching the interplay between the situational crisis communication theory (Coombs, 2007) and the image restoration theory (Benoit, 1995), the study attempted to understand the importance of crisis management at various crisis stages by comparing crisis communication strategies used by surviving and thriving companies with those by the company that failed.

Dividing a crisis management process into three stages, a content analysis was conducted to analyze five major crisis communication strategies – evasion of responsibility, rebuilding, bolstering, endorsement of outside experts and government relations – used by Chinese milk companies at various crisis stages.

The study demonstrated that Sanlu, which went bankrupt as a result of the scandal, predominately took the Chinese crisis management approach. The other three companies that survived the scandal employed western crisis communication strategies, although with distinct Chinese characteristics. Specifically, all four companies employed similar strategies during the pre-crisis stage – keeping silent/covering-up. During the crisis stage, strategies varied dramatically as companies became involved – looking for government protection and apologizing, while survivors tended to adopt a widely used western strategy – bolstering at the post-crisis stage.

The examination of crisis communication strategies at various crisis stages may shed some light on how effectively Chinese companies and possibly international companies in China can manage future crises that share similar profiles as this milk scandal and further call for attention to scrutinize the social responsibility of corporate citizens in China.

This study would fill the vacancy in research by investigating crisis communication strategies used in the largest food safety crisis in China. The findings provide insight for understanding the current status of crisis communication strategies and management within a Chinese matrix of political, social and cultural factors.

This paper aims to investigates the use of internal communications to foster workforce resilience in the cruise industry during a crisis. Drawing on the regulatory focus theory, this study explores how internal communication strategies can build employee resilience particularly at a time of difficulty. The regulatory focus theory explores the employee’s rationale for goal pursuit. Prevention-focused individuals are concerned with safety and responsibility while promotion-focused individuals focus on goal advancement. The authors seek to broaden the existing understanding of the application of the regulatory focus theory as a lens to inform internal communications crisis strategies.

Qualitative research using 15-semi structured interviews with cruise industry experts was undertaken during the pandemic. Applying a sensemaking and sense giving approach the researchers thematically analyzed the data in three stages, allowing for new theoretical insights to be uncovered.

The findings suggest that internal communication strategies should include prevention-focused messages emphasizing the cruise companies’ responsibility to employees, and promotion-focused communications, to include social interaction and individual growth opportunities.

This study’s contribution is three-fold. First, the authors extend the theoretical application of the regulatory focus theory to internal communication and identify a novel concurrent application of both prevention- and promotion-focused messages for developing a resilient workforce. Second, the authors introduce a preliminary conceptualization of an internal crisis communication strategy, emphasizing the concurrent application of prevention- and promotion-focused messages. Finally, the author offer practical suggestions for managing crisis communication strategies.

本文研究了在危机中利用内部沟通来建立邮轮业员工的复原力。借鉴规范方法理论, 本研究探讨了内部沟通策略如何促进员工的复原力, 尤其是在困难时期。规范性关注理论探讨了员工追求目标的原因。注重预防的人关注安全和责任, 而注重晋升的人则关注目标的实现。我们旨在扩展现有的知识, 将规范性焦点理论作为一个镜头, 为危机情况下的内部沟通策略提供参考。

我们对邮轮行业的专家进行了15次半结构化的访谈。 研究人员使用感性认识和感性方法, 分三个阶段对数据进行了主题分析, 发现了新的理论观点。

研究结果表明, 内部沟通策略应该包括以预防为主的信息, 强调邮轮公司对员工的责任, 以及以宣传为主的沟通, 包括社会互动和个人成长的机会。

本研究的贡献有三点。首先, 我们扩展了监管焦点理论在内部沟通中的理论应用, 并确定了一个新的同时应用预防和宣传为重点的信息来发展一个有弹性的员工队伍。其次, 我们提出了内部危机沟通连续体的初步概念化。最后, 我们为管理危机沟通策略提供了实用建议。

Este artículo investiga el uso de las comunicaciones internas para fomentar la resiliencia de los trabajadores del sector de los cruceros durante una crisis. Basándose en la teoría del enfoque normativo, este estudio explora cómo las estrategias de comunicación interna pueden fomentar la resiliencia de los empleados, especialmente en un momento de dificultad. La Teoría del Enfoque Normativo explora las razones del empleado para perseguir un objetivo. Los individuos centrados en la prevención se preocupan por la seguridad y la responsabilidad, mientras que los centrados en la promoción se centran en la consecución de objetivos. Pretendemos ampliar el conocimiento existente sobre la aplicación de la Teoría del Enfoque Normativo como lente para informar las estrategias de comunicación interna en situaciones de crisis.

Realizamos 15 entrevistas semiestructuradas con expertos del sector de los cruceros. Aplicando un enfoque de creación y transmisión de sentido, los investigadores analizaron temáticamente los datos en tres fases, lo que permitió descubrir nuevas perspectivas teóricas.

Los resultados sugieren que las estrategias de comunicación interna deben incluir mensajes centrados en la prevención, que hagan hincapié en la responsabilidad de las compañías de cruceros para con los empleados, y comunicaciones centradas en la promoción, que incluyan la interacción social y las oportunidades de crecimiento individual.

La contribución de este estudio es triple. En primer lugar, ampliamos la aplicación teórica de la Teoría del Enfoque Regulador a la comunicación interna e identificamos una novedosa aplicación concurrente de mensajes centrados tanto en la prevención como en la promoción para desarrollar una plantilla resiliente. En segundo lugar, presentamos una conceptualización preliminar del continuo de la comunicación interna de crisis. Por último, ofrecemos sugerencias prácticas para gestionar las estrategias de comunicación de crisis.