Kathryn Kalogeris

Professor Volkman
6 October 2020
Health Communication

Crisis and Risk in Class Seminar and Activity Reflection

In my health communication class, we had an entire day set aside for crisis and risk and
ethics within communication. The assignment that we did in class was to watch the interview
from the Today show that starred the CEO of Chipotle. The interview was about the E. coli
outbreaks that occurred in 2015 in multiple Chipotle locations. Along with the interview we also
read the apology letter the CEO wrote to everyone who may have been affected by one of these
outbreaks. Once analyzing these two sources we came together as a class to discuss our opinions
and what we picked up on.
When analyzing how somebody is communicating and trying to get their message across
it is important to look at their nonverbal actions. Nonverbal communication can tell someone so
much more about a message than the words themselves. When watching the interview from the
today show I could tell that the CEO of Chipotle was nervous and did not seem to have all the
answers. He showed this by not making direct eye contact with the person interviewing him and
he kept using filler words like “ummm” and “well”. The CEO of Chipotle seemed to be
empathetic to those that were affected by the E. coli outbreak, but he was not going into much
detail. Lastly one thing I picked up on during this interview was that the CEO was more
concerned about the future of the company and the stock price rather than the actual health issue
they were dealing with.
The Today show interview was only one part of this crisis that we looked at in class. The
second part we looked at was the apology letter Chipotle wrote to its customers. The letter was
very detailed and showed that Chipotle was putting time, effort, and money into ensuring that
this problem get fixed. I felt as though the letter really put the customers first and was very
specific. As a frequent customer of Chipotle, I felt good after reading this. It showed they were
taking the necessary precautions and steps to make their customers feel good eating here in the
future.
As a communication major I analyzed what the CEO did well and what he did not so
well during this crisis. This is important because a company as big as Chipotle, they want to keep
a good reputation and the only way to keep a good reputation during a crisis like this is to
affectively communicate with the public. I felt as though it was good that Chipotle had the CEO
come out and talk rather than a random spokesperson. I think that had the CEO been more
prepared and had gone into specific details about the crisis plan they had set up it would have
been better. I thought the apology letter was really good and well thought out but not everyone in
the public got to see it so it was less effective than the Today show interview.