Earlier this month, after the tragic crash of flight AI171 in Ahmedabad, India, en route to London, Gatwick, Air India CEO Campbell Wilson said what needed to be said.
He “first and most importantly” expressed “deep sorrow,” stated that the airline would be “focused entirely on the needs of our passengers, crew members, their families and loved ones,” and calmly relayed all the known facts available at that early stage.
The remarks should have elicited no reaction beyond solemn respect. At that moment, attention should have been squarely fixed on the devastation facing the families and the urgent investigation into what could have caused such a tragedy.
But many observers noticed Wilson’s words sounded familiar. Too familiar.
In fact, they were nearly identical to those delivered by American Airlines CEO Robert Isom just five months earlier — after the collision of Flight AE5342 with a U.S. military helicopter over the Potomac River. Strip away the specific details of each incident, and what remains is a speech duplicated line for line. Wilson’s remarks weren’t just reminiscent of Isom’s — they were a carbon copy. In short: they were stolen.
For such a blatant, unforced error, for such a galling lapse in judgment, one might have expected heads to roll or, at the very least, a formal apology to be issued.
But nothing of the sort transpired. Wilson wasn’t fired. The airline didn’t face a media firestorm. Public reaction was relatively muted. The story barely registered outside the echo chamber of PR professionals and a handful of journalists.
And that’s what makes this episode so revealing: crisis communication — and communications more broadly — is being reshaped.
We are witnessing an uptick in copycat messaging from business and political leaders. Just last week, Hill Times reporter Stuart Benson highlighted that Prime Minister Mark Carney’s statement responding to U.S. military strikes on Iranian nuclear sites bore an uncanny resemblance to the one released hours earlier by British Prime Minister Keir Starmer. Maybe it’s a case of shared perspective. But the alignment in tone, cadence, and structure stretched the limits of coincidence.
Yet again, like Wilson, Carney didn’t pay a heavy reputational price.
Why? Because audience expectations have shifted.
In an age where AI tools can churn out polished boilerplate in seconds, we’ve grown more tolerant of prepackaged language. We’ve started to accept a kind of functional blandness. As long as the boxes are ticked, no one’s — seemingly — overly concerned about whether the words were borrowed. Originality is overrated.
But that’s precisely why the Air India case matters.
Because plagiarism wasn’t the CEO’s only problem. As many on social media noted, the CEO’s tone was flat, detached, robotic. And that’s what made it stand out in the first place. When you watch the side-by-side video comparisons of the two men delivering virtually the same message, a study in language theft turns out to also be a study in the importance of delivery.
One CEO conveys passion and concern. The other looked like he was reading terms and conditions. You can hear and feel the difference.
And that’s the lesson.
In a crisis, words matter — but only if they’re felt.
The public doesn’t just want a response; they want a response that feels worthy of the moment. That means sincerity, presence, and emotional intelligence.
Because crises are always human. They involve human failure, human suffering, and human stakes. And that means the response must do more than tick the boxes. It has to sound like it comes from a human, too.
There is a reason we reach for those hallmark cards. While the prefabricated message inside is tender and invariably clichéd, it says, again, what needs to be said. And yet, the card means almost nothing unless the handwritten note inside delivers a more genuine, personalized sentiment.
Unless the pre-written message serves only as inspiration for the real thing.
Originality may be overrated in everyday communication. But in those high-stakes moments when trust is tested and emotions are raw — it matters more than ever. A crisis is one of those moments. And leaders would do well to remember: people don’t just want to hear the right words. They want to know you mean them.
