The Six Ps: How to respond to a social crisis with care and commitment

I wasn’t always interested in business. In fact, early on in my career, I would have described myself as radically anti-business, preferring instead to alternate between the dueling passions of Christian theology, philosophy, and social justice – which often placed me amongst a crowd that generally saw corporations and consumerism as the enemy. So it was serendipitous when the Master of Divinity program I enrolled in at North Park University in Chicago offered a dual degree program with the business school. I like to joke that I earned an MBA by accident.

Ultimately, I became enamored with my business school classes and disillusioned with the theology classes. Talking about the levers of business as powerful tools with which to change society was much more practical and interesting to me than debating the interpretations of Scripture over thousands of years. I dropped the MDiv, and leaned in on all the ways business and society intersect.

I’ve been thinking lately about the lessons in servant leadership I learned during my brief time in seminary, as CEOs and other business leaders have been asking me how to navigate a social environment ripe with tragedy and turmoil. Most didn’t expect to be in the position of not only wrestling with company policy in light of changing social expectations, but knowing when and how to care for employees who are stressed out or upset over a constant stream of negative news cycles. Leaders are being given responsibilities that are almost pastoral in nature: caring for grieving people trying to co-exist in an imperfect community.

Our personal lives and our work lives have always intersected, but now we’re coming to terms with how the boundaries we had put up to keep work work and life life were just social constructs. The walls are coming down, and leaders need to be prepared to navigate the new realities of a socially-aware employee base.

A “Six Ps” framework the 18 Coffees team has used in the past could be helpful for those looking for guidance. The six lenses help ground decision makers in the cultural context of their organizations in order to decide how to respond appropriately to social crises as they arise:

Purpose

This model focuses on how business leaders can demonstrate a commitment to change that resonates with employees and consumers. But when a company should lean in on social issues or political debates has to align with a company’s mission and stated purpose—which ideally should align with the core business.

If a company is in health care, a position on abortion and bodily autonomy will be expected. If in education, school safety and gun control will no doubt be top of mind for employees and customers. If serving Black customers, incidents of police violence will be hard to ignore. And almost every company, in every type of business, is in some way affected by our changing climate.

Making these kinds of decisions can be tough leadership judgment calls—but the world moves too quickly for the decisions to be slow moving. 18 Coffees often recommends thorough scenario planning, based on a company’s purpose, and outlining response criteria for those kinds of situations so leaders aren’t caught having to crisis plan on the fly.

People

How are your employees reacting to the situation? Are you listening to them, and providing space where needed (in one-on-ones, in all-team meetings, in group chats, etc.) for them to acknowledge what happened and process together? Whether or not an incident in a news cycle can be directly linked to your company’s stated purpose, if employees are affected, leaders have an obligation to hear them out and respond. 

It’s important to gain perspective on your employees as a collective – but it’s just as important to check in with individuals who may be affected differently than the group as a whole. Many leaders lose sight of a crisis when it only affects a small percentage of those they manage, even though historically marginalized groups are often those who are most affected by a social crisis. Last week’s shooting in Buffalo was horrific for everyone, but had a different resonance for Black employees given the community the shooter targeted.

Policy

What is documented should, in theory at least, dictate a company’s operating practices and show its commitment to its employees and vice versa. But more importantly, what is on paper demonstrates a company’s values and commits the company to doing better.

In light of the recent Supreme Court leak that portended a potential decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, many companies made public commitments to support their employees traveling out of state to attain an abortion if need be. These are tangible policy changes that may never need to be exercised, but demonstrate a commitment to women and pregnant people that goes beyond political debates.

Practice

Policies and public commitments look great on paper, but often fall apart in implementation. As people go about their jobs, focused on their everyday productivity, they can lose sight of the larger social impact goals a company has that go beyond its core business. (And it should be noted that some employees will actively disregard policies with which they don’t agree.)

Focusing on the everyday practice of the workplace may be the most important piece of the puzzle—and the hardest piece to implement. It’s where the rubber meets the road when it comes to changing an organization’s culture. Employees may hear what a manager says, and see policy changes being communicated, but if their everyday experience is still filled with cynicism from middle-managers and micro-aggressions from peers, no amount of company memos will convince them the organization has their best interest at heart.

Philanthropy

The past few years have proven that corporate philanthropy by itself is not enough to demonstrate a real commitment to change. Too many companies have narrowly defined their corporate social responsibility efforts by the dollars they give to causes, while continuing to operate business as usual in ways that contribute to social harms.

But giving in conjunction with other commitments can be a powerful signal to both employees and the market that a company truly believes in a cause. And sometimes, when an issue is important to employees but unrelated to the core business, it can show that leadership is willing to listen and commit dollars to things employees care about.

Public Statements

Language is a powerful catalyst for change. Announcing policy changes the company is making is a great start to demonstrating a public commitment to a social issue. But sometimes all people want to hear is what your company believes about the world as it is, and as it should be.

By refusing to issue a company statement about Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill—because, in his words, “​​corporate statements do very little to change outcomes or minds”—Disney CEO Bob Chapek created a showdown with his LGBTQ employees that eventually forced the company into an increasingly antagonistic relationship with local lawmakers. As recent data shows, it’s better to be forceful and consistent about what you believe than to be seen as calculating.

We operate now in a new business paradigm, one where social issues will increasingly intersect with our business operations and employee well-being. Smart business leaders will plan accordingly to react to social pressure, and embrace the new responsibility of pastoral care over their employees.