British Petroleum - Research Paper Example

With reference to the studies conducted by Vassiliou (2009), it is of essence to first note that British Petroleum (BP) is British multinational Oil and Gas Company, which has established its operations in over eighty countries across the World. Additionally, the company is ranked as the third largest energy company in the World and the fourth largest company in the word in terms of revenue earned. Norse and Amos (2010) in their writings stated that on the 20th of April 2010, there was an explosion at the coast of Louisiana, which originated from BP’s deep-sea petroleum rig that was used for drilling purposes.

Following the explosion, the rig burnt down for more than thirty hours before it finally sank into the deep sea and during this time the hydrocarbons in the deep-sea oil reserve had started leaking onto the Gulf of Mexico and it took eighty-seven days to close the leak. According to Juhasv (2011), the accident at the deep sea caused the death of eleven people most of whom were employees of the company, and several people who were near the site of the accident suffered severe injuries. In addition, the oil spill resulted into one of the worst environmental pollution in the world history and it even caused certain illnesses that were related to the spill exposure to those who participated in the clean-up exercises and some of the residents of the gulf region.

In regards to the company, it suffered huge economical expenses in the clean up and compensation exercises. This present research paper mainly seeks to analyze the communication strategy adopted by the company after the explosion and in what ways the company could improve its crisis communication strategies. According to Kotter (2012), when an organization is faced with any crisis, it is always important to communicate with all the stakeholders in order to maintain good relations with them. Equally, when BP was