Companies like Coca-Cola and PepsiCo define American interests. Whatever happens to them in a global marketplace often reflects not only on them as a brand but on their brand as a surrogate for the United States. The advantages this surrogate brand enjoys in foreign markets during “peacetime” make it all the more volatile when it faces a corporate crisis. It is not just Coca-Cola or Pepsi; it is the personification of America.

After Katrina and 9/11, one would imagine that businesses were shocked into understanding the significance of improved crisis communications planning. Yet according to a recent survey by the Conference Board, one quarter of companies worldwide lacked a pandemic flu preparedness plan.

The essence of crisis communications is an ethical approach to the subject at hand – one cannot communicate effectively if language and intentions are laced with insincerity or deliberate deception.

But what happens when the corporate culture is shaky when it comes to ethics? How does this effect crisis communications?

For all that’s been written about risk, issue, and crisis management, there’s no evidence that organizations are any more effective at managing them. Why do some companies turn disasters into crises, while others manage to contain the fallout? One can break the problem down into three areas.