Leading Through Crisis:

Overview

When crisis hits, people look to leaders for clarity, confidence, empathy and direction. But even the strongest message can be undermined when departments contradict one another, elected officials get ahead of confirmed facts, or multiple voices compete to tell the public what’s happening.

This intensive, practical workshop focuses on leadership communication when the stakes, and pressure, are at their highest. Building on proven crisis communication principles including speed, credible messaging and victim-centered communication, participants learn how to lead the communication response while helping their entire organization speak with clarity and purpose.

Participants will explore how to:

• Lead with clarity, credibility and empathy when information is incomplete and events are moving quickly.
• Oversee a unified communication strategy that gives employees, stakeholders, media and the public consistent, actionable information.
• Coordinate with elected officials before and during a crisis, establishing who communicates what, when and why to reduce competing messages, speculation and public confusion.
• Manage the tension between speed and accuracy, recognizing that silence creates an information vacuum but rushing unverified information can damage credibility.
• Keep victims and affected communities at the center of leadership decisions and public messaging.
• Navigate AI, misinformation and the fight for public trust. Explore how generative AI, manipulated content and the accelerating information environment are changing crisis communication—and why trusted public institutions must work harder than ever to establish themselves as the credible source of truth.
• Prepare before the crisis by establishing communication protocols, leadership roles, approval processes and relationships before they are tested under pressure.

Through discussion, case studies and a complex tabletop exercise, participants examine how department leaders, communications professionals, and elected officials can work as one coordinated team to move through a crisis with trust and resiliency intact.

Tuition

Tuition includes all instruction and handouts. Lodging and meals are excluded.

• $575 Non-Member
• $525 ILEA Member

Who Should Attend?

This course is tailored to experienced public information officers or executives with responsibility for internal and external communication.  This class provides new approaches for those seeking resources and skills to further develop their abilities as a strategic communications advisor for their agencies. 

Schedule and Speaker

Daily 8:30 am to 4:30 pm

About the Speaker

Judy Pal has spent much of her career where policing, leadership, crisis and public trust combine.

With more than 40 years’ experience in communications and management, Judy has served in executive positions with major law enforcement organizations across North America. She was an Assistant Commissioner with the New York City Police Department; Chief of Staff for the Baltimore and Milwaukee Police Departments; and a command staff member overseeing public information for police departments in Atlanta, Savannah and Halifax, Canada. She also served as Director of Operations for FBI-LEEDA.

Throughout her career, Judy has helped law enforcement leaders navigate critical incidents, officer misconduct, controversial use-of-force issues, international scandal, terrorism and other high-profile crises where information moves quickly and public trust is at stake.

Her approach to crisis communication goes well beyond media relations. Judy focuses on communication as a leadership responsibility: providing timely and credible information, keeping victims at the center of the response, and ensuring that executives, operational commanders, PIOs, other departments and elected officials understand their roles.

Judy also addresses the rapidly changing challenges of artificial intelligence, misinformation and disinformation, and what public safety leaders must do to remain a trusted source of information in an increasingly difficult communication environment.

Founder and principal of 10-8 Communications LLC, Judy has trained thousands of law enforcement leaders across North America and internationally including the Major Cities Chiefs Association, Major County Sheriffs, and through FBI Regional Command Colleges across the country. A former broadcast journalist, she is also the lead author of the Department of Justice COPS Office Strategic Communications for Law Enforcement Executives.

Her perspective is grounded in experience on both sides of the camera and inside the executive command boardrooms when the stakes are highest.

TCOLE Credit

Law enforcement personnel attending this course are eligible for fourteen (14) hours of Texas Commission on Law Enforcement Officer (TCOLE) credit.

Overnight Accommodations

Other Information

Course Cancellation Policy

Occasionally, the Institute for Law Enforcement Administration (ILEA) may be forced to cancel a scheduled program. Whenever possible, the decision to cancel is made at least fourteen days prior to the start of the program, and registered participants are notified once that decision has been made. If the distance to the training site requires that you make airline and/or hotel reservations, please contact ILEA (+1.972.244.3430) to inquire about the status of any program before making travel arrangements. While paid registrations in cancelled courses will be refunded in full, ILEA will not be responsible for monetary loss due to cancellations or changes in airline or hotel reservations.

Eligibility Policy

The Institute for Law Enforcement Administration provides  professional education and technical support to the law enforcement community. 

A registrant in an ILEA program must be a sworn officer; a civilian employee of a law enforcement department; or an employee of a municipal, county or state agency.

Anyone interested in attending an ILEA program who does not meet the above standard requirements will need to request advance approval. Such requests will be considered on a case-by-case basis.

Privacy Policy

We do not sell or rent information to any outside parties. By providing your information, you will receive postal and electronic communications from the Institute for Law Enforcement Administration (ILEA) of The Center for American and International Law (CAIL) in accordance with CAIL's Privacy Policy. If we co-sponsor a program with another organization, information may be shared between the parties. All such co-sponsors will be identified on the event details and registration page. At any point, you can opt-out or unsubscribe by selecting either link at the bottom of each email or call us at 972.244.3400.