Presidium Network– Crisis Management – Breaking News Support

Journalists contacted

Countries picked up in

Interviews set up

Interested In Working With Us?

Objective

OggaDoon supported the Presidium Network in raising awareness of the plight of individuals in dangerous areas of conflict, such as Afghanistan and Ukraine. This involved the creation of key messages with fact-checked information, establishing a communication process in a breaking news environment with rapid dissemination, and responding to the breaking news desks’ requests from the global media. We updated them on the status of individuals fleeing from the Taliban or held captive by Russian soldiers.

The communication goals were to highlight the relevant authorities’ awareness of the facts in each situation to aid evacuation and emphasise the importance of not entering war zones without the training and support of experienced humanitarian agencies.

Afghanistan:

Following the UK and American troop pull-out of Afghanistan, members of an education program for girls were in danger as the names and addresses were found by the Taliban. They needed to find safe passage out of the country.

As conflicts or dangerous situations arise, the true situation on the ground is often unknown and can change very quickly. Therefore, information needs to be fact-checked and shared with various relevant authorities to enable safe passage for individuals who have found themselves in dangerous situations.

Ukraine:

As the Ukraine war unfolded, some non-trained individuals entered the war zone with the kind intention of helping people to safety. However, the intelligence they gained placed them in danger, and they were taken captive by Russian soldiers. The Presidium Network became aware of their plight, and we worked with them to disseminate fact-checked information with the objective being to:

Highlight that the prisoners were not trained military operatives but volunteers.

Reinforce the fact that only trained professionals should enter war zones that change by the minute.

Ukraine media vehicles alerts to drive safe war zone practices.

The Presidium Network is a UK humanitarian aid non-profit organisation that supports communities in crisis to manage humanitarian issues and represents the needs of people affected by violence or poverty to international policymakers.

Challenges

In a breaking news environment, the media are hungry for the key details of the story. They want to be the first to break the news and are keen to get exclusive interviews. They are also keen to put a sensational spin on news, so keep to the facts. Everything is on the record.

Crisis communication responds to or raises awareness of a specific type of threat, and its magnitude, managing outcomes, and driving specific behaviour to adopt to reduce the threat or reputational damage. Presidium Network is in a supportive role in the context of this project, but a crisis management approach still needs to be taken in these breaking news scenarios.

Method/Solutions

Built pitch lists and approached journalists interested in particular topics. It is important that you create the key factually approved messages quickly and get them out to journalists in a consistent way. Responding quickly to incoming requests, sharing news and managing expectations. Developing a good process with the journalists and spokespeople, using different communication platforms across email, WhatsApp, or Signal is key.

Result

OggaDoon set up over 120 interviews for the Presidium Network, with political TV, radio, and newspaper reporters from around the world. Fact-checked updates were sent to 300 journalists as the different scenarios unfolded. The Presidium Network raised awareness of its NGO activities across global platforms.

Interested in Working With Us?

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“Working with OggaDoon has been a fantastic experience and the support has been incredible. OggaDoon were incredibly impressive in keeping up with our emergency response work and being able to manage the sensitivity of our work on such a public forum through the press. Nicola was incredible being available evenings and weekends to help bring the press we needed, to support the crisis work we were doing with captured volunteers in Ukraine.

The results from press coverage are often hard to measure, however the positive response from the news articles creates the positive environment to allow for the captured individuals to be released and the families to be in contact before the release.

Not only did Nicola and OggaDoon get us press coverage from the key broadcasting and print news outlets, such as BBC News, Sky News and The Independent, but they also helped us manage the inbound enquiries from the flood of journalist requests internationally.

We gained direct press interviews in countries such as France, US and Ukraine but also picked up in 23 countries as reprint articles. OggaDoon guided us through press releases all the way through to interview techniques to make sure we got our message across. We wouldn’t have been able to achieve what we did without OggaDoon’s support.” – Dominik Byrne – Presidium Network.

Guerilla Tactics Used:

Media relations

Content creation