To stay ahead of the curve, we share insights on current crisis events such as the CrowdStrike outage of July 18, 2024, offering analysis and next-step recommendations.

CrowdStrike Crisis Communications Review

• PR Crisis Affects Share Price: With no timetable for resolution for four days and Delta threatening to sue for flight delay losses, CrowdStrike share price dive 32% within 12 days.
• 6Cs Framework: CrowdStrike did not display concern, clarity, control, confidence, competence and context in its communications, exacerbating a crisis situation.

PR Takeaways

• PR Must Review Management Tweets: George Kurtz, CrowdStrike CEO, made things worse by issuing a non-apologetic tweet on July 18, 2024 followed by an apology in a Sky News interview hours later.
• One Source of Information: Set up a joint crisis communications newsroom with the affected partner. Crowdstrike looked worse when Microsoft blamed its lax kernel access management on EU regulations.
• Ask the Right Questions Internally: Use the Gini Dietrich model to guide crisis communications.
• What's the worst thing that could happen?
• Is this scenario an issue or a crisis?
• How big is our risk?
• Can it be prevented?
• What would escalate it to a crisis?
• Who needs to know and when?