PR Education / When Something Goes Wrong

Say what you do not know, and correct fast

Acknowledging the gaps buys credibility, and a quick correction is forgotten far sooner than a slow one.

There is a widespread belief that admitting uncertainty undermines authority. The opposite holds. A statement that says the cause is not yet established and that an update will follow by a stated time is more believable than one that projects total command, because readers can tell the difference between confidence and completeness. The credibility comes from the boundary being drawn honestly: this is known, this is not, this is being checked.

The rule that follows is to never fill a gap with a guess that sounds like a fact. Guesses get repeated, then contradicted, and each contradiction costs more than the original silence would have. It is entirely acceptable to publish a statement whose main content is that you do not yet know something, provided you say who is finding out and when they will report.

Corrections follow the same physics. An error acknowledged within hours, in the same channel, with the wrong version plainly marked as superseded, is a minor event that most readers forget within a week. The same error contested for a fortnight, corrected quietly, and never acknowledged in the place where it appeared becomes the thing the institution is remembered for. The cost is almost never in the mistake. It is in the interval between the mistake and the acknowledgement, and that interval is entirely within the institution's control.