Senior consultant, Nexus Learning Studio Anneliza Zainal, CEO of A&W Malaysia George Ang, and chief investment officer of Berjaya Mutual Bhd Nazri Khan shared their insight in a forum titled “Strategic Communication in Crisis Management” which was moderated by FMT’s managing director Azeem Abu Bakar.
The forum was held in conjunction with the Media Specialists Association (MSA) Festival & Awards 2024.
Anneliza, formerly a caregiver manager at Malaysia Airlines, said handling the MH370 and MH17 crises taught her the importance of answering customers’ needs and complaints seriously.
“During and before an incident, overlooking or taking customer’s complaints as something minor will damage the company’s reputation,” she said.
Anneliza added that the company had to provide humanitarian care to families and employed trained communication professionals to avoid further aggravating the emotions of the distraught next of kin.
Ang shared that effective communication helped his company navigate the crisis brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown.
He said the most valuable lesson he gained was that a company must take action to protect its brand image, rather than only focussing on salvaging the revenue lost during an emergency.
“Because one day, the crisis will go away and your brand is still there … And you want people to think about your brand positively,” said Ang.
He said that regular internal communication also helped the company to remain intact during the movement control order.
Ang shared that the company constantly assured its employees of its financial capability to survive the pandemic and communicated with them about their business strategies.
Meanwhile, Nazri suggested that financial organisations should pre-empt crises before they happen considering the high-risk environment of the investment industry.
“Understand the needs of our stakeholders. Be transparent with them. Make sure that when a crisis happens, we already have a plan for them.
“We also need a squad of professionals to spread the right messages,” said Nazri.
Other notable speakers at the MSA Festival & Awards 2024 included CelcomDigi deputy CEO Albern Murty, Mastercard South East Asia vice-president, head of integrated marketing and communications Dheeraj Raina, Google Malaysia industry head Rohan Raghavan, TikTok Malaysia head of agency partnerships Kenn Wee, head of GrabAds Malaysia Melinder Virk, as well as podcast hosts Khairy Jamaluddin and Shahril Hamdan.