Crisis Management Planning: A Case Study of Man-Made and Natural Crisis Events in Higher Education

Due to crisis events that have shocked several college and university campuses, many of these institutions have begun to look for ways to respond effectively to those events. However, higher education is generally not equipped or prepared to respond to crisis events. Thus, crisis management research in higher education should be explored. Principles of organizational learning and organizational development from corporate management America were used in this qualitative study to explain how leaders in higher education institutions prepare for crises and learn from their crisis experiences. Chaos theory provided the theoretical lens for the study. Purposeful sampling was utilized to select two institutions and purposely identified administrators at those sites. Interviews gleaned the lived experiences of the participants. Data analysis revealed five themes: conflicting definitions, institutional response to crisis, continuous learning, institutional issues related to a crisis, and leadership roles during a crises. The findings support the importance of developing a crisis management plan, disseminating the plan to all stakeholders, and application of continuous learning principles to evaluate the plan and actual crises responses before, during, and after a crisis event.