A crisis can bury a career, rescue it, or redefine it. That is the premise at the center of Crisis Management: Insider Views of How Business and Political Giants Won or Lost Big, And How You Can Apply the Lessons, Itay Ben-Horin’s new book, and it is also the argument he has been making for 25 years inside boardrooms, political war rooms, and corporate meltdowns.
“There is no one rule,” he says. “Always attack, always apologize, those formulas do not work. It has to fit the character of the client.”
Ben-Horin is one of Israel’s best-known communications strategists and a longtime crisis-management specialist. He says he entered the field a quarter-century ago and helped build what he describes as Israel’s largest communications consulting firm. Crisis work became his focus early on, partly because it interested him most and partly because it sat at the center of the most sensitive work for both public figures and organizations.
His book, adapted from an earlier version and reshaped for a wider international readership, strips out some Israeli examples that he felt would be less relevant abroad and adds a chapter on the families of hostages taken to Gaza. It examines 16 cases from around the world, using a Harvard-style case-study model: lay out the situation, test the possible openings, then study what the company or leader actually did. Benjamin Netanyahu, Angela Merkel, McDonald’s, and Starbucks all appear in the book, but Ben-Horin says the real point is the analysis, especially the view from inside the room.
Crisis management starts with a simple distinction
For him, crisis management starts with a simple distinction. There are bad days, and there are moments that can change the future of a career or an organization. “Crisis management is like the playoffs,” he says. Some figures survive and reinvent themselves. Others never recover. He points to Al Gore’s post-politics pivot to environmental advocacy and to Lance Armstrong’s collapse after the doping scandal as examples of how a crisis can send public life in radically different directions.
One of his most revealing comparisons involves two political scandals from the same era. Bill Clinton and Netanyahu each faced a personal affair during a primary campaign. Ben-Horin views the contrast as a classic example of style and fit. Clinton appeared with his wife, projected intimacy and imperfection, and shifted the conversation back toward the economy. Netanyahu came out alone, frustrated, and confrontational. Ben-Horin argues that both approaches worked because each matched the politician using it. In Netanyahu’s case, he says that episode helped launch a method Israelis would come to know well: attack, redirect blame, and survive.
He is equally interested in cases where institutions used a scandal to force change. He cites McDonald’s response after criticism over unhealthy food and Starbucks after a racism incident in one of its branches during Donald Trump’s first term. At first, companies often deny, deflect, or attack. The smarter ones eventually recognize that the public has moved ahead of them. “Every crisis has to be managed in the right way,” he says, and in practice that means assembling the right team fast: legal, capital markets, employees, regulators, and media. First response, first structure, and first signal are crucial. “Think fast about the first response,” he says. “Think slowly about the strategy.”
That stress on timing runs through the whole conversation. Ben-Horin dislikes space in a crisis. He says leaders cannot afford to leave the arena vacant while they search for the perfect line. At the same time, he warns against confusing visibility with effectiveness. The wrong spokesperson can deepen the damage. A chief executive may need to front the crisis, or a technical expert may need to speak instead, especially in cases like food poisoning or product safety.
His position on interviews is blunt. “Everyone will regret an interview they missed,” he says. Yet he is not arguing for silence. In a real crisis, he says, leaders often do need to speak publicly, because supporters cannot defend them without facts. The question is whether the person doing it can actually carry the message.
The strongest section of the book may be the most Israeli one. On the morning of October 8, Ben-Horin says, he received a WhatsApp message from Renana Gomeh of Kibbutz Nir Oz. She immediately understood that the media would also play a role in the battle. Working with former cabinet secretary Oved Yehezkel, he says, the team carved out a distinct campaign around kidnapped children, building an international effort that included public figures, legal voices, and a petition by Nobel laureates. The message was clear and morally unambiguous: children should not be involved in any war. Ben-Horin believes that focus helped create a message that worked both emotionally and strategically. “Speak to the head and to the gut,” he says. “If you speak only to the gut, it is not enough. The reverse is also true.”
That line comes closest to his larger thesis. Crisis management is judgment under pressure, tailored to the person, the audience, and the moment when the ground starts moving.