Every week it seems another major business crisis story hits the news, sometimes with a personal twist,. At the moment, the Petters trial is waning, the Denny Hecker trial just gearing up, and assorted other business communication crises continue to percolate, including the safety recall at Toyota. We spent some time recently in the UST MBC degree capstone course talking specifically about Toyota, and Hecker came up. The class discussion hovered for a bit on how/when/why Toyota leader Akio Toyoda, grandson of the firm’s founder, decided to make his first statements a week after the turmoil began. Hecker has long been quiet, then suddenly “broke his silence” and did the first press conference since the local media frenzy began around his corporate and financial issues.
If timing is everything, when is the right time to face the cameras? It depends. (more…)
