Stress-testing international corporate affairs teams for Rolls-Royce

Rolls-Royce approached us to test its global corporate affairs teams as part of a wider exercise testing its global crisis management structure and processes in response to a serious product issue.

Given the real-time nature of the modern media landscape, integrating social media into the wider communications response enables companies to:

  • Receive early warning of any issues impacting their products via proactive monitoring
  • Issue instant posts and updates to reassure investors and staff
  • Provide executives with flexibility in terms of how they communicate with key stakeholders

We used our Simulator platform to challenge teams across three different markets by delivering real-time Twitter and Facebook-style feeds including witness imagery and accounts, as well as live on-scene reporting by journalists and media outlets. We also tested how responders managed misinformation emerging on social media channels.

Authentic news-style videos were used to bring the exercise to life and maximise impact. Our on-site interview team conducted media training with company executives during the exercise using a mixture of different styles and formats.

Our showreel gives an idea of the kind of news videos we produce for these kinds of exercises:

Key findings highlighted during the exercise informed updates to its global crisis management structure and processes.

Project Outcomes

“We engaged with The Social Simulator to support us with the delivery of a Group-wide crisis management exercise.

The team worked with us to build an interactive social media and media environment that our exercise participants could observe and interact with in real-time during the exercise.

All the media feeds were extremely realistic and they helped to add the pace and complexity that we would expect from the modern news environment.

The exercise helped us to clarify our future training needs, as well as helping to highlight a number of required updates to our crisis response protocols.

The training that products like The Social Simulator allow – with a real-time and adaptive pseudo media element – help to take continuity training to the next level and ensure that it remains in step with the wider technological and social developments impacting the field.

The Social Simulator team were a pleasure to work with; they really helped to bring our exercise to life.”

Andy Marshall, Business Continuity and Crisis Management Lead, Rolls-Royce plc

How could we help you?

Talk to us informally about how we approach this kind of work, ballpark budgets and timescales – or just to help you refine your brief: email [email protected]