One Crisis, Many Audiences: Internal & External Communications Lessons from a Cybersecurity Incident
Within hours, a cybersecurity incident creates one of the most complex communications environments an organization will ever face: one crisis, many audiences, and often none of the tools communicators rely on to do their jobs. This session is led by a corporate spokesperson for a Fortune 500 insurance company who served in that role during a recent cybersecurity incident and who also serves as a long-time integrated marketing communications instructor at West Virginia University.Drawing from firsthand experience, the workshop shares the real story of communicating internally and externally when core systems are unavailable, information is changing by the minute, and pressure from many stakeholders escalates simultaneously. The session examines real-time internal and external communication decisions, including the many trade-offs communicators must make when legal, technical, human, and business realities collide.
Rather than offering a theoretical crisis planning session, this workshop emphasizes practical lessons learned: the importance of backup tools, the need to prioritize audiences and align communications team members, and how organizations can learn from and emerge stronger from a crisis.
Participants will think through and refine their own incident communications plans and toolkits using realistic scenarios drawn from the incident. The session reinforces a core truth of crisis communications: while no organization is ever fully prepared, intentional planning can meaningfully improve outcomes when an incident strikes.
Bio:
Matthew Cummings is the director of strategic communications at a Fortune 500 auto, home, business, and life insurance company. In this role, he leads the company’s media relations and internal communications teams.
Prior to joining ERIE, Cummings served as assistant director of online programs in the West Virginia University Reed School of Media and Communications and was a lead instructor in the Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) graduate program, where he taught and managed IMC 410, the program’s introductory course. He has taught at WVU since 2006 and received the program’s Alexia Vanides IMC Teaching Award in 2012.
Cummings’s award-winning marketing communications career spans more than 25 years across corporate, nonprofit, and education settings. He has served as a communications director for public school systems, as a vice president at a regional advertising agency, and spent five years in commercial radio as an on-air announcer and producer.
A native of northwest Pennsylvania, Matthew is a graduate of West Virginia University’s IMC program. He also holds a Bachelor of Arts in communications from Edinboro University of Pennsylvania and completed graduate-level studies at Seton Hall University (strategic communications) and the University of Nebraska (education administration).
In 2025, he was named PR Person of the Year by the Northwest Pennsylvania Chapter of the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA).