James Helm, former BBC correspondent and DFID’s current director of communications, sets out six tips for communicating in an emergency.

This blog was originally delivered as a speech to an audience of international development professionals at Bond’s annual conference in Westminster.

Having been at DFID since 2010, I’ve had extensive experience communicating about a series of humanitarian crises, including Typhoon Haiyan, the Nepal earthquake, the Ebola crisis and the ongoing situation in Syria. Here are some key things to think about.

1.    Prioritisation

Prioritise from the moment a crisis hits. Clear the decks and talk to colleagues about what now constitutes priorities. Bring in extra people from other teams to help your resources. Having good people on board is the key to dealing effectively with a crisis.    

2.    Proximity

Make sure communications are involved in all operational efforts, and consider deploying a media officer or content-gatherer to the field immediately.  There are benefits to your comms team working closely with the operational response team throughout the response, involving them in every meeting and every conversation to ensure the messaging is as clear as possible.  

3.    OASIS

Plan your response with rigour and professionalism.  At DFID and across government, the acronym OASIS is used to form the basis of their communications strategy.  O stands for setting your objectives, which are important to define at the outset in order to measure your effectiveness.  A is for audience - who do you want to speak to? S is for strategy - what’s your plan? The next step is implementation, and the final S is for scoring or evaluation.

4.    Voices

It is important to plan in advance the voices that will represent you in a crisis. Is it your chief executive, and if so, is he or she media-trained? Do you have strong, credible voices who can speak on the issue? Encouraging resilience among your people and your organisation is important when responding to difficult situations under pressure.

5.    Collaboration

Working together is fundamental to ensure an effective response, not just internally but with external partners, the media and the team in the field. A collaborative approach is essential to curating valuable content and communicating clearly. Talk to partners.

6.    Content

Engage and inform people in a creative way by bringing the stories from the frontline to life.  Good content is essential for engaging audiences.  Step back and consider what happens beyond the immediate “news cycle”, and think about the follow-up stories which will capture people’s imagination.

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