Communication professionals are too often brought in at the eleventh hour to manage crises they could have helped prevent, according to Oluwafunmilayo Ajala, Chief Storyteller at The Baruch Company Ltd.
In a pointed critique of common corporate practices, Ajala highlighted a recurring scenario in Nigerian organisations: a senior director calling the communications team late in the day with an urgent request to prepare messaging for a major restructuring announcement, with rumours already circulating among staff.
“You were called to clean up. You should have been called to plan,” Ajala stated, describing how critical decisions on restructuring, policy changes, and organisational shifts are frequently made in finance meetings, legal reviews, and executive sessions without any communication input.
By the time the brief reaches the communications desk, the decision is already final, leaving little room for strategic counsel. The result, she noted, is staff feeling blindsided — not because the messaging itself is poor, but because the timing and sequencing of the announcement erode trust before a single word is released.
“The problem isn’t being called late. It’s that nobody planned to call you at all,” Ajala emphasised. “That’s not strategic communication. That’s damage limitation with a deadline.”
Ajala, an experienced PR and communication strategist with over a decade in corporate, digital, and political communications, advised communication leaders on how to shift from reactive to proactive roles. She urged them to frame their value in terms of risk mitigation rather than mere message crafting.
“Instead of saying ‘I’ll craft the message,’ say ‘I can tell you what questions staff will ask before you’ve answered them.’ Leaders who ignore messaging quality rarely ignore risk,” she advised.
Key soft skills she identified as critical for gaining early access to decision-making rooms include organisational curiosity — understanding how decisions flow and who influences them — and strategic listening. Asking probing questions such as “How will frontline managers explain this to their teams?” can position communicators as valuable contributors earlier in the process.
Ajala also stressed the importance of building relationship capital outside of crisis situations. When communication teams only engage department heads during announcements, they will always arrive too late to influence outcomes.
She explained that early involvement of communication experts helps prevent avoidable pitfalls: poorly sequenced announcements that feel like betrayal, policies that become unwanted headlines, and decisions that spark unnecessary resistance.
“Early involvement isn’t about perception management. It’s about better outcomes — fewer failures, less resistance, and fewer public fires that started as private sparks,” Ajala said.
She encouraged communication professionals to identify any ongoing decision in their organisation and insert themselves with one powerful question: “Have we thought about how this will land?”
Ajala concluded by challenging her colleagues: “Have you ever shaped a decision, not just the message, because you were in the room early enough to matter?”
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