Not every communications challenge requires a long-term strategy, a major rebrand or a year-long content plan. Sometimes you need to create a concentrated burst of attention around a specific issue, initiative, announcement or opportunity.

The Communications Campaign Lab is a practical workshop that teaches you and your team how to design and execute a bounded, short-term campaign for maximum impact — without confusing, diluting or competing with your brand.

You will learn how to identify a clear campaign objective, define the audience you need to move, develop a compelling central idea and build a focused mix of communications tactics around it. You will learn how to create campaigns that are memorable enough to cut through, disciplined enough to deliver results and aligned closely enough with your identity to strengthen your brand long after your campaign has ended.

The workshop draws on lessons from capital campaigns such as Toronto French School’s Can’t Wait campaign, political campaigns and high-impact public-affairs initiatives. It explores what great campaigns have in common: a bounded objective, a sense of urgency, a clear emotional proposition, disciplined messaging, coordinated execution and a beginning, middle and end.

The Communications Campaign Lab is ideal for communications, marketing, public affairs, advancement, government relations and leadership teams preparing to launch a:

• • Public awareness or advocacy campaign
  • Fundraising or capital campaign
  • Major organizational initiative
  • Policy or government-relations campaign
  • Product, program or service launch
  • Recruitment or engagement campaign
  • Time-limited reputation or thought-leadership initiative

You will work through the full campaign-development process:

• • Creating the capacity and relationships you need to succeed
  • Defining the specific change the campaign wants
  • Identifying the audiences, barriers and opportunities that matter 
  • Developing a campaign idea that is distinctive but still belongs to the brand
  • Building messages, proof points and calls to action
  • Choosing the right mix of earned, owned, paid, digital and stakeholder tactics
  • Creating momentum through sequencing, milestones and moments
  • Establishing roles, timelines and decision-making processes
  • Measuring whether the campaign changed awareness, attitudes or behaviour
  • Planning how the campaign will conclude and what it will leave behind

Here’s the core principle:

A strong campaign should intensify your brand — not replace it.

You will leave with a practical framework you can use repeatedly and the foundation of a real campaign plan for an issue or opportunity facing your organization.

Half-day: Campaign Fundamentals
An introduction to the framework, supported by case studies and practical exercises.

Full-day: Campaign Builder
Participants apply the framework to a live organizational priority and leave with a draft campaign architecture.

Two-day: Campaign Lab
Teams develop, test and refine a complete campaign plan, including messaging, tactics, sequencing, sample content and measurement.

Come with an objective. Leave with a campaign.

A cyber breach isn’t just an IT problem – it’s a reputational crisis. You need to respond quickly and precisely without losing further data or trust. The organizations that can recover are the ones with a strong strategic crisis communications plan in place. 

Our Cybersecurity Crisis Communications Simulation and Playbook Development training equips your senior leaders and communications teams with the tools they need to respond effectively to cyber incidents, protect their brand, and maintain public trust.

This immersive and interactive training session is designed for high-stakes decision-makers. We don’t just teach you how to manage a cyber crisis; we put you in the middle of one. 

Developed and led by crisis communications experts Lloyd Rang and Jeff Keay, this training session ensures that when a cybersecurity breach happens, your team is ready to respond with confidence and clarity.

What makes this training different?

• • Specifically designed for cybersecurity breaches, including ransomware attacks, data leaks, and system hacks.
  • Fully tailored to your organization’s industry, structure, and potential risk scenarios.
  • Live crisis simulation with hands-on decision-making and press conference exercises.
  • Step-by-step playbook development that gives you and your organization a framework to use in future cyber crises.

Our customized crisis communications training is geared to: 

• • Communications leaders and executives responsible for shaping crisis response strategies during a cyber incident
  • C-Suite and Senior Leadership Teams who need to communicate with employees, regulators, and the public.
  • Communications and PR Teams that will be drafting statements, engaging with the media and managing external and internal messaging
  • Cybersecurity and IT Leaders who will ensure alignment between technical response teams and communications teams.

We divide our training into three key sections, so you’ll get the chance to learn the skills and practice them with practical applications.

1. Crisis Communications 101: Manage a Crisis in Real-Time

• • Learn to recognize and assess a cybersecurity crisis before it escalates.
  • Understand the regulatory, legal, and reputational risks in the wake of a data breach.
  • Identify the role of communications teams versus IT teams.
  • Plan the essential materials every crisis response team must have, including:
    • Key messages
    • News releases
    • Internal communications plans
    • Social media content
    • Media Q&A documents

2. Create Your Cybersecurity Crisis Communications Playbook

• • Establish clear roles and responsibilities between IT, Communications and Legal in the event of a cyber breach.
  • Develop internal checklists, escalation processes, and decision-making frameworks.
  • Gain the best practices for coordinating messaging with legal and compliance teams.
  • Understand transparency versus containment and how to balance disclosure while managing reputational risk.
  • Learn to monitor your crisis response and conduct an effective post-breach debrief.

3. Live Crisis Simulation: Test Your Response Under Pressure

How It Works: 

• • Your team is given a realistic cybersecurity crisis scenario tailored to your industry.
  • You’ll work in teams to create a real-time crisis response, including:
    • Key messages & internal communications
    • Q&A preparation for media inquiries
    • Social media content & official statements
    • A press release
  • Your session concludes with a mock media interview, where our facilitators ask team spokespeople tough, real-world questions.
  • We’ll complete a debrief and evaluation, giving you our expert feedback on your team’s response highlighting strengths, gaps, and opportunities for improvement.

President and Narrative Lead for Curious Public.

Executive Consultant and Strategic Leadership and Media Consultant for Curious Public.