BY PROVIDENCE OBUH

The Director of Corporate Communications and CSR, Airtel Nigeria, Mr. Emeka Oparah, has highlighted the imperative of putting the social media into consideration in crisis management.

He said this in his paper titled: “Contemporary Challenges in Reputation and Crisis Management” in commemoration of the 60th birthday symposium for Dr. Wole Adamolekun, at the Performing Arts Theatre, Elizade University, Ondo State.

He said this in the light of trying to provide insights into how Airtel Nigeria managed its 2011 call centre crises in Abuja and a bomb attack on one of its showrooms in Kano, in 2012.

Oparah said that the engagement of key stakeholders’ is significant to successful crisis management especially in the new communication world order ruled by social media, just as he urged communication executives to pay close attention to social media.

“With the overwhelming influence of this new media, it is important for media managers to adopt a proactive and robust strategy in managing its influence on stakeholders.

On the 2011 Abuja call centre crises, he said that Airtel leveraged on its massive goodwill to engage all the various stakeholders, noting that without a clear social media strategy at the time, the telecommunications briefly lost control of the crisis which cost it significantly in reputation and financial terms