PRE-CONFERENCE WORKSHOP

TUESDAY, JUNE 24, 11:00-1:30PM EASTERN

Crisis Communication for Exec Comms Pros Now

For leaders, crisis communications used to mean oil spills, plane crashes, Tylenol poisonings and 60 Minutes reporters. Now it means, Wednesday.

Beyond being more frequent, crises are now harder to resolve, in a madly polarized and politicized cultural climate.

Harder, but not impossible.

Katie Garcia counsels senior leaders in crisis, in her role as senior advisor to the legendary Logos Consulting Group. She’s developed this workshop for the executive communicators who leaders turn to to help them make smart choices to preserve or restore trust in a crisis.

You will learn:

• The drivers of trust and how communicators can harness those drivers to maintain trust early in a crisis or, if needed, to restore trust that has been lost.
• The decision criteria to determine what leaders must do and say early in a crisis, and the further criteria to determine when to communicate.
• How to identify and address communications to reasonable people with appropriate expectations, rather than cater to the trolls, gadflies and incorrigible adversaries.
• How to work with the lawyers to get a win/win: maintaining trust early while not increasing the risk of legal liability later.
• Proven elements of statements (and lawyer-proof public apologies) that can be drafted quickly and delivered early in a crisis to lock in trust.

As Katie Garcia and her Logos colleagues like to say: Between self-destructive blabbering and self-defeating silence there’s (still) lots of room to maneuver.

This interactive workshop will help you find that sweet spot.

AGENDA

(All times Eastern)

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 25: EXEC COMMS NOW

11:00-11:45 • Research Report: Where Is Exec Comms Now, and Where Do We Think We’re Headed? Fresh Findings and Helpful Insights.

What pressures are leaders facing, and from whom—and how are they facing them down? To the extent that leaders are staying out of controversial public conversations, where are they focusing their communications? And—maybe most importantly—what do they need and expect from their exec comms pros? To give you a handle on the state and future of exec comms in one of the strangest moments in every exec comms career, we partnered with Gravity Research, the firm that corporate c-suites rely on “to anticipate risk, spot opportunity and rationalize reputational concerns against a backdrop of evolving public pressures.” In a keynote presentation, Gravity’s Thought Leadership VP Joanna Piacenza will unveil the brand new findings for the first time; ECC Member Advisor Sharon McIntosh and ECC Executive Director David Murray will discuss; you’ll compare notes; and we’ll all chart a way forward.

11:50-12:15 • Thought Leadership: In Exec Comms, It’s Back to the Future

How can leaders stay out of the all-encompassing political maw, but still lead important conversations that help society and their business? By finding a thought-leadership platform that’s under the radar or above the fray—and intensely, organically related to the company’s mission, vision, and expertise. For almost 20 years, Pete Weissman has been helping leaders of major institutions do compelling, sustainable thought leadership. He’ll describe the kind of thought leadership that works these days—and how (and why) to start the process with your organization’s leaders.

12:20-12:40 • Exec Comms, and AI: Where Are We With This, Exactly?

The cliché is, exec comms pros won’t be replaced by AI, but by exec comms pros who know how to use AI. Well, how are AI-proficient pros using this stuff? Independent executive ghostwriter Cheril Clarke has been using AI since the outset and swapped best-practices with many exec comms colleagues. She’s has developed a seasoned series of do’s and don’ts that will help you make AI work for you and your exec comms crew.

12:45-1:30 • The Southwest Warrior: A Career Conversation with a Communicator Who had a Thirty-Year Comms Career in an Extraordinary Organization

Linda Rutherford joined Southwest Airlines as a Public Relations Coordinator, in 1992. Over the next three decades, she rose through the ranks of communications—and beyond the surly bonds of communications—to become the airline’s Chief Administration Officer, where she oversaw all of communications and culture, human resources, technology, training, inclusion and belonging, internal audit, AI and data transformation. She retired this year from her executive role and will join us to candidly share the secrets to her success and offer insight on how you, too, can weather turbulence in your organization … without losing your bearings. Bring your deepest career questions for one communications executive who has seen it all—and overcome it all with heart, humor and a little tough love.

1:30-2:00 • Talk Directly with Today’s Speakers

Whichever of today’s sessions interested you the most—join the speaker in a dedicated Zoom room, for a freewheeling Q&A where you can ask the speakers whatever you like as you consider how to apply these ideas to your own organization, and your own leaders.

THURSDAY, JUNE 26: EXEC COMMS FUTURE

11:00-11:45 • What in the World Are CEOs Supposed to Do Now? A Keynote Conversation with Jeffey Sonnenfeld

Jeffrey A. Sonnenfeld wrote “a map to guide the corporate executive through the increasingly important but largely uncharted terrain of public affairs.” In 1981. By now, the Lester Crown Professor in the Practice of Management at Yale School of Management has spent the last 44 years not only as a leading thinker on corporate leadership and leadership communication, but a crucial influencer of leaders, as convener of Yale’s legendary CEO Summits and advisor to CEOs and presidents and nominees from both parties. Sonnenfeld has seen, helped and privately and publicly goaded CEOs and other institutional leaders through responses to countless social and economic crises—from South African Apartheid through the Russian invasion of Ukraine. But Sonnenfeld and the leaders he advises have faced no crosscurrents stronger than our current national and global political maelstrom. Now the legendary “CEO whisperer” whispers to us, about how business leaders can navigate this uncharted terrain: effectively, and still—responsibly.

11:50-12:15 • Influencing Your Principal: Three Factors That Make Your Relationship with Your Leader (or Break It)

Benjamin Timpson spent 13 years in the British military as a communications advisor to admirals and generals, often working under intense pressure on operations around the world. Though success and disaster, Timpson identified the factors that determine whether this unique relationship flourished, floundered—or failed. He’ll teach share them here, and you’ll learn how to reach a stressed and overwhelmed CEO when you need to … how to make sure leaders take the action you need … and how to prep your comms team to make the most out of every CEO interaction, whether it’s 30 seconds or two hours.

12:20-12:55 • How to Help Nontraditional Leaders Become Great Communicators

Longtime University of Rochester writing and public speaking professor Amy Arbogast coaches neurodivergent speakers to connect with audiences even when they can’t easily meet conventional public speaking expectations around eye contact, vocal variation and dynamic body language. Arbogast will teach you to help such speakers leverages their differences as strengths. Meanwhile, Jim Holtje specializes in speechwriting and delivery for non-native English speakers. A multilingual C-suite speechwriter for international corporations—and a Columbia University professor who’s taught hundreds of students from over 40 countries—Jim will teach you how to structure and write speeches that effectively cross languages and culture. He’ll also offer train-the-trainer techniques for helping principals with delivery. You’ll be a more versatile exec comms pro after this session than you were before it.

1:00-1:30 • What Is a ‘Great Place To Work’ Now—and What Kind of Leadership Communication Do Such Workplaces Require?

For more than 30 years, Great Place To Work has helped to identify and define—and thus, influence—great workplaces. As the global authority of workplace culture, they’ve answered the crucial question: What makes people fulfilled over time, and how do organizations and their stakeholders benefit from creating such environments? At one of the most disorienting moments in our political and professional lives—and thus, at most of our organizations—we’ll check in with Michael C. Bush, CEO of Great Place To Work to talk to him about how organizations are building or maintaining great workplaces—and specifically, what characterizes leadership communication in such institutions.

1:30-2:00 • Talk Directly with Today’s Speakers

Join the Benjamin Timpson, Amy Arbogast or Jim Holtje in a dedicated Zoom room, to ask whatever you like as you consider how to apply these ideas to your own organization, and your own leaders.