An unfortunate combination of high passenger traffic, record-setting temperatures and wild winter storms left airlines scrambling to get customers to and from their destinations ahead of the 2022 Christmas holiday. While many airlines recovered in a day or two, Southwest Airlines canceled 63% of its flights, leading to chaos for millions left scrambling to reach their destinations.
For Southwest, this was an operational disaster. But, on the communications front, Southwest Air CEO Bob Jordan put several tried-and-true crisis communications tactics to use to make the best of a seemingly impossible situation. Here’s a short list.
Crises are an unfortunate but realistic part of any organization. By following many of these crisis communications strategies, our team at The Agency at Sikich has helped countless clients navigate a wide variety of rocky roads – from customer service emergencies, to data breaches, social media trolls to product recalls.
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