Com 310 – Technical Communication
Instructor: Holly Burnside
Crisis Communication Assignment
For this assignment, I want you to choose a business crisis of some sort and write two
separate documents, both of which are intended as “damage control.”
1. The first document will be an internal memo to a relevant company employee whom
you are making aware of the crisis.
2. The second document will be a letter to a local newspaper, television station, or other
media outlet explaining how the company is dealing with the crisis.
The crisis should be something that is likely to create a serious problem both within a
company and with its customers/public. Examples include: a police incident, fraud,
tampering with a company product, ignoring problems with a product, falsifying data,
hiring improprieties, racial or sexual discrimination, etc.
A draft of both documents will be due in class for peer review Friday October 15th, and
the final drafts will be due Monday October 18th.
