The Roseanne Train Wrecks at Top Speeds

I haven’t been able to avert my eyes from the Roseanne train wreck for so many reasons — so many reasons — but chief among them is the speed with which it all happened.

Not just on Roseanne’s part, or ABC’s, but also on the parts of other people or entities that the Roseanne train slammed into on its way to a full stop.

Like the maker of Ambien.

What is the takeaway for communications professionals, or, really, any company operating in an unpredictable world?

Be ready at a moment’s notice.

We’ve already written here at Ditto Trend Comms about crisis communications — one of our core competencies — and the Roseanne dumpster fire is yet another example of the need for an active, living crisis communications plan.

What it underscores is just how fast news cycles can move now — and if your company isn’t ready to act quickly, you will go down with the ship. (I’ll stop now with all of the mixed metaphors.)

Crisis communications plans can seem daunting. But here are two easy first steps you can take:

• Form your crisis team (i.e. who are the five people who need to be on that conference call after you read the Roseanne tweet that mentions your product by name?); and
• Identify the five most likely disasters/crises that your company would need to respond to.

In my experience the most difficult parts of that first response in a crisis are (a) getting consensus from company leaders; and (b) pressing “post” quickly enough on that response Tweet.

Do all of this work in advance. I bet the makers of Ambien didn’t think they’d be dealing with Roseanne this week, but it’s clear they were ready.