Retired U.S. Navy Rear Admiral Craig Quigley, who served as the senior uniformed public affairs officer in the Defense Department during the 9-11 terrorist attacks, gave a presentation on crisis leadership to Elon students, faculty and staff on Monday, Jan. 9. Details...
In his presentation, “Communicating with the World in Real Time: Crisis Leadership of 9-11 and the Time Ahead,” Quigley described what it was like to be working at the Pentagon when the plane hit on the morning of September 11, 2001. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld immediately ran to the site of impact and helped with rescue efforts until his security detail pulled him out, Quigley said, adding that the evacuation of 20,000 people from the Pentagon was “amazingly orderly.”
Quigley, who was accustomed to briefing reporters at the Pentagon as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense (Public Affairs), quickly set up a press center at a nearby gas station. “The first thing we needed to do was to communicate with the American people the circumstances surrounding their military,” he said. From this makeshift briefing area, Quigley delivered a “critical first message” to the world — that the American military was still functioning and was ready to respond to the president’s command.
Quigley said that when faced with a crisis, it is vital for leaders to tell the truth and resist the temptation to guess at answers at a time when not much information is known. “It’s been my experience that first reports in a crisis are often wrong,” he said.
According to Quigley, a leader must be able to make decisions with imperfect information while remaining calm, confident, inspirational and visible during a crisis.
He said that 9-11 was President George W. Bush’s “finest hour as a leader” and praised Secretary Rumsfeld for holding a press briefing at the Pentagon the evening of the 9-11 attacks to send the message that he would not be driven from his headquarters.
After his presentation, Quigley took questions from the crowd. When asked to compare President Bush’s reaction to 9-11 to the response after Hurricane Katrina, Quigley said that Bush put too much faith in Michael Brown, then director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Brown was not qualified to hold that position, Quigley said, adding that leadership was poor at the local, state and federal levels in the aftermath of Katrina.
A 1975 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, Quigley served 27 years in the Navy. He is currently vice president for Communications with Lockheed Martin Naval Electronics & Surveillance Systems.