Crisis management by Public Relations team

By Kriti Raj

Apeejay Institute of Mass Communication (AIMC) not only gives theoretical knowledge, but also provides practical industry-based knowledge. We students of ADMC and CCEM are divided into four groups representing agencies: Lintastic, OGSphere, Edellens and Communique. We are working on a hypothetical service and have planned 360 degrees IMC campaign comprising an event, public relations strategy, digital strategy, out-of-home advertising, print ads, television commercial shoot and focused group discussion.

It was D-day for our television commercial shoot of Team Lintastic for the hypothetical service under the mother brand Swiggy. It was a dream come true for us as for 5 months we were working on the TVC script, location, shortlisting the cast, arranging props and assigning roles for the shoot. The shoot location was at one of the team member’s houses in Paschim Vihar, New Delhi. Our call time was 9:30 morning and our whole team along with the cast went to the location. Everything was going smoothly according to our expectations. The shots and the visual depiction were the same as we had visualised.

It is said that a crisis can take place at any point of time. The same thing happened during our TVC shoot when our chef had to leave in the middle of the shoot due to some emergency at his place. It was a very stressful situation for all of us. The public relations team- Grishika Jaggi, Kriti Raj, Lokesh Saini and Priyamvada Chauhan of our group were there on their toes to overcome this crisis.

Grishika Jaggi said “Guys, let us connect with the chefs through LinkedIn. We’ll get someone who could join us online for the shoot.” Meanwhile, Lokesh Saini added, “A crisis can be a unique opportunity to change your path to explore new opportunities that will help you become the person you want to be.” Kriti Raj suggested, “We should look for someone who matches the physique of our chef.” Another member Priyamvada Chauhan said, “We should consider someone who stays near our shoot location.”

Solution made by our proactive public relations team

We started analysing the whole situation and conceptualising the call to action. We started hunting for a new chef by shortlisting profiles of hotel management students. After a lot of discussions, we finally found another chef matching the physique and personality of our previous chef. The chef was at our shoot location in about an hour. Our Director, Sohon Simlai gave him a rough idea of the TVC script. As he was a fresher, we gave him basic culinary and garnishing knowledge. After all this, finally, our hard work paid off and the shoot came on track in no time. The new chef was a quick learner and the shoot wrapped up according to our schedule. It was a fun-filled yet memorable day for us as we got the opportunity to handle real-life crises and gained in-hand experience. This would not have been possible without the support of our mentor Professor Dr Pijush Dutta. We are grateful to him and looking forward to more such opportunities to handle real-life scenarios.