Tom Sandoval Needs a Better Crisis Comms Team
If you scroll social media, peruse pop-culture headlines or talk to literally anyone invested in reality TV, chances are you’ve heard about #Scandoval by now. If you haven’t, here are the three things you must know to continue reading:
Man (Tom Sandoval) cheats on his long-term life partner (Ariana) of 9 years with her best friend (Raquel, aka Rachel)
All said parties are reality stars of Vanderpump Rules fame
Affair is uncovered while season 10 is unfolding on TV screens and social media implodes declaring it “Scandaval”
Need or want a more robust TL;DR? Peruse this PPT.
I’m new to the Vanderpump Rules drama and in my short time catching up via a perfectly curated must-watch playlist (kudos, Brooke), there are so many more rabbit holes I could take you down, dear reader. But we don’t have hours of time and I don’t have a white board to draw you a map of the cast’s intertwined dating histories.
The reason you’re reading this blog is because there are actually some very important crisis communications lessons we can learn from Tom Sandoval’s missteps navigating the implosion. Keep these things in mind the next time you’re navigating a crisis:
Be Accountable
One of the most important rules of crisis communications is to take responsibility when you f*** up. Tom failed to do this well when his first public comment pleaded for people to not take out their anger on his bar. While it’s very valid to acknowledge how his personal decisions were impacting his business partners and employees’ livelihoods, he failed to explicitly accept responsibility, instead opting to make vague references like “this was a very personal thing.”
There are so many issues with this rushed, half-assed statement that my red pen might run out of ink trying to address them all so I’ll leave you with these takeaways:
When a crisis goes down, it’s important to act transparently. Acknowledge what happened, accept responsibility then move forward to apologizing (more on that later) and offering solutions to mitigate future problems.
You only get one chance to make your first public statement. While speed matters in crisis situations, reacting emotionally without a plan will almost certainly result in more damage control down the road.
Apologize
The other mega issue with Tom’s poorly crafted social media statement? He failed to apologize to the one person he owed an apology to the most - Ariana. In fact, it took another 3 days for him to even publicly acknowledge how his actions hurt her. Even if they were having private convos, it’s table stakes for him to address his actions in a public forum because the crisis was playing out publicly. That’s kind of the gig when you choose to capture your life on camera for 10+ years.
Instead, his second statement should’ve been his first and it should’ve come out much sooner than it did. Here’s what you can do to not make the same mistake:
Throw it back to a playground lesson we’ve all (hopefully) learned - when your actions hurt other people, acknowledge it and offer a genuine apology. It’s critical to speak directly to the people impacted by the crisis and offer a heartfelt apology. Failing to take this step only adds fuel to the fire and roadblocks the ability to move forward.
Learn
In the PR world, we do our best to prepare for crises in advance. Unfortunately, we can’t anticipate everything which is why one of the most important things we can do is listen and learn in real-time and reflect after the fact.
Only time will tell if Tom has truly learned from his mistakes but spoiler alert, he’s already blowing that piece about learning in real-time. After his disastrous social statements, you’d think he’d take a step back before making more public statements. What did Tom do? He went on Howie Mandel’s podcast to frame himself as the victim of a loveless partnership, working to justify his actions and garner sympathy because everyone is judging his personal life. Whew boy do I have soapbox for this one but it really boils down to this:
Media training matters. Spokespeople will get eaten alive during a crisis if they can’t stay on message and deliver those messages with empathy. Tom stumbled over his words and spent way too much time justifying his actions and not enough time focusing on how he’d make changes for the future.
Post-crisis debriefs can be just as valuable as pre-crisis scenario planning. Einstein once said, “the only source of knowledge is experience” so make sure to capture key learnings and update the crisis plan to make the future situations a little bit easier to navigate.
Want to dive deep into Vanderpump drama? Want to chat about crisis best practices? I’m here for either. Just not if you’re Tom Sandoval.