Public Relations, Brand Communication, and Marketing
Written Report
Review the Boeing crisis (737 max crashes lion air and Ethiopian airline) and compare it with
another company crisis that has occurred not before January 2019, so it should must have
happened this year.
Decide which was handled well and which badly, and analyse the effects on brand and
reputation for both crises. You must defend your opinion.
Hints for the written report:
Remember this is a Master’s degree assignment. Description of what happened is not enough
to pass, in fact you will get an (F). You must show critical analysis of the case. You should
apply one or more of the theories from class or from the extensive literature on marketing,
public relations or crisis management.
For higher marks apply several theories and reach a synthesised evaluation based on what
you have learned from using the different theories and frameworks.
You should consider such things as:
1. Defining crisis in general and business referring to literature
2. Descriptive details of the problems of the companies (Boeing and the one you choose) in
terms of crisis,
3. and media and link it to public relations and marketing.
4. Media coverage: did the media cover the issue fairly?
5. Media handling: did the organisation successfully communicate through the media?
6. Social media: to what extent did social communications drive the crisis? How did the
organisation(s)
7. respond?
8. Did the crisis arise internally or was there an external catalyst?
9. How well did the organisation handle technical aspects of the crisis?
10. How well did the organisation handle communications aspects of the crisis?
11. In what way or ways did the fact the two crashes occurred outside the US affect how the
issue was
12. handled?
Note:
Comparison with references should be well done as “management summary” in which
everything should be summarized in a well understood way.
Examples of how issues were handled well should be added for example from media, social
media, reports, graphs, newspapers, and referenced (for students who want grade A)
Lessons learned paragraph from the crises that you will be discussing should be included
It is proffered If in terms of what you see Boeing did badly in managing the crises that you
choose a company that did good to have a great comparison and vice versa
Recommendations overall and for the company that did not do well must be added
It may or may not be necessary to consider all of the above points depending on the nature of
the crisis you have selected.
Your opinion is crucial, but it must be well argued and supported in the facts. You must cite
references throughout.
(Please write in third person party as you are an academic writer, correcting papers will be
tough but you are master’s students near the end of your degree so you must do your effort)
Tips:
• Use frameworks such as
– Situational Crisis Communications Theory
– Storytelling
– Stakeholder Theory
– Grunig & Hunt
– Others that you have researched
– PEST or PESTEL theory
– 4 PS if needed
• Use Marketing and/or PR terminology
– Check your glossary and other sources
• Focus on making your assignment critical
• Compare and contrast the case studies
• Include academic journal articles
• Limited use of Google
