Obviously, any corporation hopes not to face "situations causing a significant business disruption which stimulates extensive media coverage" (crisis). The public scrutiny that is a result from this media coverage often affects the normal operations of the company and can have a (negative) financial, political, legal and governmental impact. Substantial value destruction is to be feared of, especially when the crisis is not handled well in the perception of the media / public opinion. Crisis management deals with giving the right crisis response (precautionary, structural and ad-hoc). Executives at all levels of the organization are employed to manage crises and often do so on a daily basis. Their skills are really tested when they have to manage significant crises that have the potential to disrupt the organization's value creation process, income sources, operating expenses, stock price, competitive position and ongoing business. The most effective crisis management occurs when potential crises are detected and dealt with quickly--before they can impact the organization's business. In those instances they never come to the attention of the organization's key stakeholders or the general public via the news media. In instances where the crisis already has erupted, or it is inevitable the crisis will impact the organization's key stakeholders, a business continuity plan is helpful to minimize the disruption and damage. Developing such a plan can seem like a daunting task, but in actuality it is a common-sense document. It involves identifying those functions and processes that are critical to the business, then designing the operational and communications contingency plans to deal with the potential failure of one or more of them and how key stakeholders will react when they find out. Corporations with business continuity plans for responding to likely disruptions will be in a better position to minimize the business impact and financial damage. However, the