3P’s to help turn Crisis Into Opportunity

“Never waste a crisis. All eyes are on you at that moment—how you respond says a lot about your company and its values.” – Kaden Jacobs. 

Crises are inevitable, but a company’s future trajectory depends on its response. The key to turning a crisis into an opportunity for clients often lies in this structured approach: Pause, Pivot, Promote. 

To gain insight to this method, I spoke to Paquin PR Managing Director Kaden Jacobs. He has handled crises for years across multiple industries – from school systems to hospitals. To start, we encourage clients to ask these essential questions:

For clients:

• What went wrong? 
• What circumstances led to this crisis? 
• How transparent are we willing to be to resolve it?  

For PR Professionals: 

• What do I know about this company and its market standing? 
• How have other companies handled similar crises? 
• What should or could the outcome of this crisis be?

Let’s break down what it means to Pause, Pivot and Promote in order to turn crisis into opportunity.

Pause: The first step is to pause and assess the situation with clarity and honesty. A well crafted holding statement can provide the necessary time to gather accurate information and formulate a response. This statement should not only acknowledge the crisis but be formulated with empathy and align with the client’s core values.

Pivot: Once a business has assessed the situation, it must pivot its communication strategy to properly address the crisis. Pivoting may involve halting all regular communication (but not always), conducting an investigation to ensure accuracy and crafting new messaging that reinforces brand values. 

Promote: Lastly, promote! In this step you want to not only reinforce your hard-earned reputation, but also proactively work to rebuild any lost equity. The company has now taken responsibility and is focusing on ensuring messaging can effectively show that through continued empathetic communications aligned with their values. Kaden explains, “To display transparency and change the narrative, brands can engage directly with stakeholders on platforms like Reddit where communities form and meaningful conversations happen. This open direct engagement can strengthen credibility and build trust.”

A crisis, while challenging, presents businesses with opportunity. Companies that Pause, Pivot, and Promote effectively will not only recover but emerge stronger. “Your ability to approach new opportunities after a crisis is really dependent on how you lived out your values in response, and if you’ve taken responsibility. If you haven’t, you can’t seek out new opportunities because you haven’t used the one in front of you,” says Kaden. Success post-crisis is subjective and varies by organization but the common measures include resuming normal operations and demonstrating responsibility. Don’t forget that what may seem like a win to a PR professional might not look the same for a client.

Ready to turn adversity into advantage? Contact Paquin PR for expert guidance in crisis management and reputation recovery.