Özet:

In today’s conditions, where technological developments are progressing very rapidly, sharing and circulation of information make it easier for people to question whether institutions are fulfilling their responsibilities. In this case, the reputation of institutions can be damaged in the face of a negative situation or during a crisis. The correct implementation of “crisis response strategies” during a crisis is vital to ensure that institutions' reputations are not damaged. In this context, it is aimed to reveal how important the crisis response strategy developed at the first moment of the crisis is for the reputation of the institutions within the framework of Situational Crisis Communication Theory, by discussing the crisis communication and management process of Soma Holding, which owns the mine in the mining disaster in Soma in 2014, as a case study. The analysis performed within the framework of this aim was conducted within the assumptions and suggestions of “stages of crisis management” of Coombs and by benefiting from Harrison’s “Basic Conditions of Crisis Communication” principle. In this study, it is seen that there is no crisis management plan prepared by Soma Holding in the “pre-crisis phase”, which is one of the crisis management stages of Coombs. At the same time, it was observed that the firm did not accept the existence and responsibility of the crisis by using the “rejection (denial)” strategy from the “crisis response strategies” during the crisis response phase. At the same time, it has been understood that Soma Holding, which closed itself during the crisis, failed to use communication tools during the crisis and the lack of communication caused the crisis to grow further. As a result, it has been demonstrated that loss of reputation is inevitable in the post-crisis period.

Anahtar Kelimeler: