Crisis communications process template [legal-focused (South Africa)]

Crisis communications process template [legal-focused (South Africa)]

When something goes wrong, what you say in the first few hours can make or break your legal position. This template gives you a clear, legally informed crisis process so you do not panic post, overconfess, or ignore your obligations.

What this product is
A practical, South African crisis communications playbook from a legal angle. Not PR fluff. It helps you decide what to say, when to say nothing, and when to call your lawyer or a regulator.

Who it is for

• Solopreneurs, founders, and CEOs

• COOs, ops and customer support leads

• People and HR managers handling internal incidents

• In-house legal or risk leads at startups and SMEs

When to use it

• Suspected or actual data breach or cyber incident

• Serious product or service failure affecting customers

• Regulatory complaints or investigations under POPIA or the Consumer Protection Act

• Employee misconduct, harassment, or discrimination allegations

• Any incident that could damage your funding, reputation, or key partnerships

What you get

• Clear “how to use this in a real crisis” cover section for founders

• Fillable company details page for your crisis team, legal contacts, and regulators

• Quick start crisis checklist for the first 60 to 120 minutes

• Step-by-step crisis comms process, including.

  • Golden rules before anyone says anything

  • Legal triage checklist and explicit escalation triggers

  • Decision flow on who may speak, and on which channels

  • Plug and play holding statements for outages, data breaches, investigations, and internal staff comms

  • Founder checklist before any public statement or interview

  • Record keeping and legal privilege guidance

  • Post-incident review prompts

• Optional modules. social media protocol, investor and board communication notes

• Annexures: incident log template, sample escalation email to legal, post-incident review template

• Plain language annotations explaining why each step matters and common mistakes to avoid

Difficulty and time to complete

• Difficulty: Medium

• Time to set up for your business: 60 to 90 minutes

• Open the checklist, follow the steps, drop in a holding statement

Why founders buy this

• Reduces the risk of self-incrimination and non-compliant statements

• Gives you ready-to-use wording when you are under pressure

• Helps you show investors and partners that you have a grown-up process for bad days

Download the template, fill in your details, and park it with your leadership team so that when something breaks, the comms do not.