What specific steps can you take to turn consumer anger into opportunities for gain, whether you are dealing with:

• customers who are dissatisfied because the product doesn’t work, or because they think you lied about service or cost;
• concerned interest groups who are blocking a license, rate increase or permit;
• potential litigants who are seeking to assign liability or sue for damages; or
• the need to develop new media strategies that rely less on image manipulation and more on cooperating with opposing groups?

In our special, two-day, executive program Dealing With an Angry Public, we share a powerful negotiating technique for managing or avoiding public disputes – and for dealing with the media – that you can apply whether you are attempting to defend controversial decisions or trying to protect your organization from the consequences of an accident or a mistake.

Called “mutual gains,” this innovative approach offers a set of specific action steps you can take to turn public threats into opportunities for gain.

Please accept my personal invitation to attend.

Lawrence E. Susskind
Co-Director, MIT-Harvard Public Disputes Program

To apply, please contact Prof. Lawrence Susskind at (617) 253-2026

You Need to Communicate More Effectively With Angry Publics

Confronted by the need to take effective action in the face of public anger (e.g., over a devastating accident, failed products or services, or the siting of a controversial facility), many executives make the mistake of turning to a flawed public relations approach to managing public expectations.

They retreat behind a shield of expert testimony or big-name endorsements and fail to seize control of the situation by building solid relationships that will enable them to be heard and trusted.

Too often, they lose the chance to convert a potential disaster into an opportunity to build understanding, to enlist the support of would-be detractors and to substantively enhance their organization’s image.

At the MIT-Harvard Public Disputes Program, we have developed a powerful and proven process for dealing more effectively with people who are upset or angry – from customers, abutters and environmentalists to potential litigants, investors and consumer advocates – and for using the media to get your message across.

Based on mediation and negotiation techniques developed at The Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School, these innovative crisis avoidance and conflict resolution strategies can dramatically improve your ability to achieve positive and productive outcomes, whether your objective is to respond to customer discontent, acquire a permit, license a product, seek rate or rule changes, or settle product liability.

Designed for use in both corporate and regulatory arenas, this process will help you, quickly and at minimal cost, regain credibility and restore lost faith with your consumers, with people who have been adversely affected, or with those who challenge you in a regulatory context.

You’ll learn a framework for working with the public to avoid damage or further damage and for positively affecting public perceptions by better understanding the other side’s interests, turning confrontation into problem-solving and inventing options for mutual gain.

At This Program You Will Learn . . .

. . . how to employ a mutual gains approach to resolving important differences with angry publics, whether they are:

Customers who are angry because you’ve let them down:

• your product doesn’t work, or it’s perceived as unsafe
• you said something that wasn’t true
• you failed to live up to a promise

Advocacy groups who want to sue you . . .

• claiming malpractice
• citing unfair employment and hiring practices
• demanding product-related liability

Neighbors and abutters up in arms over:

• the siting of a new facility
• perceived health risks posed by experimental production techniques
• changes you are bringing to their town or neighborhood

Environmental groups threatening you over:

• the use and disposal of toxic materials
• packaging, manufacturing or recycling practices
• land use changes

Regulators who are being pressured by others to:

• deny you a permit
• turn down your request for a rate increase
• pass rules that will restrict or change your operation

Those affected by an accident which could lead to:

• a threat of catastrophe
• demands for restitution
• boycotts of a company’s products

Using specially developed exercises, simulations and case studies, we have designed a unique executive briefing and workshop. The following is an overview of the agenda for this intensive two-day program:

Day One

1. Understanding the Problem: What’s Wrong with the Conventional Approach to Dealing With An Angry Public?

The traditional approach to deflecting public concern and restoring corporate image may work in some situations, but it won’t work when you are confronted directly by an angry public which perceives unacceptable risks and impacts.

The traditional approach won’t help when someone:

• stands in the way of your acquiring a “right” that is vital to your organization
• is having a negative impact on your profitability

Using complaint departments, staged media events, expert testimonials or one-shot hearings won’t solve the real problems. Includes a simulation highlighting the key elements of the “mutual gains approach” in a case involving a defective product.

2. Key Elements of the Alternative Approach to Dealing With An Angry Public

How to avoid or minimize damage by turning confrontation into constructive negotiation. Key strategies for managing conflict and for:

• identifying appropriate stakeholder groups
• finding effective stakeholder representatives
• meeting face-to-face
• determining interests
• inventing options for mutual gain
• transforming informal agreements into implementable solutions
• jointly agreeing to monitor results – on a regular basis
• using neutral mediators

3. Dealing with Resistance to a Calculated Risky Decision

Participants will apply the mutual gains approach in the context of a multiparty interactive role-play: Dealing With Potential Risks of a New Technology. Participants must formulate a problem-solving strategy through multiparty, multi-issue negotiation facilitated by a neutral convener. Different from a crisis which arises as a result of a mistake or an accident, you’re in a proactive situation because you’ve made a conscious decision to go ahead in the face of risks and strong public opposition.

The risks may involve potential environmental damage, threats to public health or a loss of community safety. But you believe there are legitimate reasons for you to proceed. What are your options? How do you decide whom to talk to?

How can you best satisfy the concerns of an angry public which may include people from your own organization? What do you do about individuals who are totally unrealistic or who seek to manipulate the situation for their own gain? Includes lessons on the use of neutral mediators and on ways of uncovering the real interests of the other side.

Day Two

4. Dealing With Disagreements Over Values

How can you work things out with an angry public when you have fundamental disagreements about what’s right and what’s morally acceptable? How do you give weight to the values or ethical arguments of each side? You will be placed in a group situation where you must reach a policy decision involving a community dispute over a sensitive health care issue. The case will explore the most effective ways of talking about and dealing with value differences.