Many Facets of Leadership, The

Chapter 21. Effective Crisis Management: Now More Than Ever

Idalene Kesner

Ever since the incidents involving Johnson & Johnson and the Tylenol poisonings in 1982, corporate executives have been keenly aware of the need for effective methods to deal with organizational crises. Indeed, following the Tylenol incidents many firms established crisis management programs. Although these programs vary from firm to firm, the overriding message of crisis managers has been that effective crisis management begins with prevention.

Experts agree that the best-handled situations are the crises that never happen—the crises that are averted because of outstanding detection mechanisms both inside and outside affected organizations. And, although crisis prevention ...