In Crisis, Utilities' Message Got Lost

Nov 27 - Record, The; Bergen County, N.J.

 

When the Federal Emergency Management Agency needed to reach North Jersey residents left in the cold and dark by superstorm Sandy, it printed fliers and sent agents into the streets to distribute them. In Ridgewood, elected officials also printed sheets of paper to give residents, telling them where to find ice and other necessities they needed to get through an extended power outage.

New Jersey's utility companies, however, communicated with out- of-power customers through email and online social media. They also held regular briefings with reporters where company officials stressed how tough their jobs were and how many employees they had out in the field working long hours to make repairs.

That message didn't reach many customers who had no Internet, no radio and no way of charging their smart phones because their homes were flooded or their power was still out. And, in the estimation of several crisis management experts, it probably didn't resonate much with customers who had power but wanted to hear less about how hard the task was and more about how close, realistically, it was to being completed.

The challenge of restoring power was hard enough after Sandy, New Jersey's most damaging storm ever, and, amid the frustration, it's hard to imagine how North Jersey's power companies -- the Public Service Electric and Gas Co., Jersey Central Power & Light and Orange & Rockland Utilities -- weren't destined for a public- relations drubbing.

But, in Sandy's wake, a significant question has arisen about whether, apart from their performance in restoring power, the three companies, to one degree or another, made life harder on themselves and more frustrating for their customers by failing to communicate as effectively as they could have.

Citing improvements instituted after Hurricane Irene last year, when the companies were roundly criticized, Robert Hanna, president of the state's Board of Public Utilities, which regulates the industry, said last week that communication with customers was the area that still needed the greatest improvement.

"I had many, many calls from mayors who simply were not getting enough information," he said. "And even though the utilities had done what they were supposed to do and appointed a liaison for each town, those liaisons either lacked information or were not given good information. I don't know what was worse -- people not getting any information or being told the wrong information, but that was very, very frustrating and understandably so."

Governor Christie, answering questions from reporters after a Sandy recovery event at a firehouse in Middletown Township on Monday, said the utility companies need to be more forthright with their customers.

"One of my major problems with the utility companies is we've got to continue to encourage them to tell the truth," he said. "I think what I came to discern right after this was not a lack of communication -- because I think there was plenty of communication - - [but] sometimes the communication being given was inaccurate.

"I think that's kind of human nature to some extent, [but] we've got to break through that."

Christie's example

Crisis management experts say the key to effectively managing any disaster is to quickly turn the coverage of the story away from the unfolding crisis and toward the efforts to handle the problem and prevent it from recurring. That's out of a modern industry playbook that was written in New Jersey in 1982, when Johnson & Johnson masterfully handled a crisis that threatened the Tylenol brand when seven people in Chicago died after taking Extra Strength Tylenol that had been laced with cyanide.

Johnson & Johnson immediately recalled all Tylenol capsules, and then re-launched the product only after making their bottles virtually tamperproof.

In the best cases, experts say, a crisis can actually be used as an opportunity, and Governor Christie's approach to Sandy has been hailed as an example of how decisive handling reassured the state's residents and added to their trust in his leadership.

"The secret is to keep your communication lines open and be forthright with what you can and can't accomplish," said Joe Markert, a professor at Rutgers University Business School who teaches management and executive leadership.

Some experts say the companies could have minimized the criticism by letting people know when the lights were coming back on, with consistently accurate information. If that was difficult to know, they could have provided a better explanation, for example, of how some sites, such as hospitals and water-treatment facilities, were given priority status.

Instead, they often provided town-by-town restoration estimates that were overly optimistic.

In the first week after the storm, PSE&G estimated that 19 towns in North Jersey would have power restored by the end of the weekend, but the lights came back on in only two of them.

"That exacerbates the negative feeling," said Matthew Golden, a vice president at The College of New Jersey and a professor who teaches crisis communications.

Christie, meanwhile, made major decisions, held daily media briefings and went on regular -- and very personal -- tours of flood- damaged areas.

Golden said Christie did "several things well, from a communications perspective" while responding to Sandy.

"He speaks with a great deal of emotion, both in expressing frustration and in showing compassion for those who are suffering," Golden said. "That makes people feel a connection, because they believe he is genuinely angry and cares about their plight."

Emerging stronger

PSE&G tried to reach out to some of the hardest-hit communities it serves, such as Moonachie and Paramus, after the storm by offering ice, water and charging stations.

Orange & Rockland said it handled a record number of customer- service calls after Sandy hit, using a new, automated outage- processing system. More than 99 percent of the 295,000 calls received during the week of Sandy were answered, said Michael Donovan, an Orange & Rockland spokesman.

JCP&L did not respond to a request for comment.

Joe Forline, vice president of customer solutions for PSE&G, said the utility communicated regularly with local officials and issued "work plans" that tried to estimate when work crews would arrive in neighborhoods, even though they were often off the mark.

Forline called it "a useful tool."

"We've continued to improve it," he said. "I think it's as accurate as it can be."

Still, Paul Aronsohn, the mayor of Ridgewood, was critical of how well all this added up on the ground.

"We had a lot of folks being told their power was back on even though it's not," said Aronsohn, who criticized PSE&G in the days after the storm and urged residents to register their complaints with the company.

By contrast, he said the village officials started communicating with residents about the storm well in advance, and kept it up throughout the response, even when they had to resort to sending printed fliers to those without power.

"Communications, to me, is absolutely essential before, during, and after an event," said Aronsohn, who is also the director of executive communications for Bristol-Meyers Squibb and was communications director under former Gov. James E. McGreevey. "I gave everybody my cellphone number and my email. I just wanted to give them a place to go to get information."

But just as important, he said, was getting out accurate and honest information, "even if that's saying, 'We don't know.' "

The utility companies could eventually come out of Sandy in a stronger position, Markert said, by using memories of the power outages to convince customers that previously unpopular improvements, such as costly substation upgrades, are now imperative.

But looking back on the utilities' crisis-management performance during Sandy, even their harshest critics might have to admit that they were saddled with a difficult burden -- what Golden, of the College of New Jersey, termed their "functional response," meaning getting the lights back on. That wasn't happening very quickly.

"Your communications success is very dependent on how well your functional response is managed," he said. "No matter how well you communicate, people will become frustrated and resentful if you can't get their power turned on for an extended period of time."

Originally published by Staff Writer Anthony Campisi contributed to this article. Email: reitmeyer@northjersey.com.

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