Just about every crisis in history has produced heroes and villains. There were FDR and Hoover, Churchill and Hitler and Kennedy and Khrushchev to name just a few.

The same holds true for recent business crises. For every Jobs, Buffet and Gates, there seemed to be an evil doppelganger such as Lay, Skilling and Kozlowski.

So, the question arises: who will be the heroes and villains of today's seismic crisis? Who will rise to the occasion, demonstrate nerves of steel, rally the troops and stay the course? And, conversely, who will look for the quick buck, the easy way out, the coward's course?

My firm will join two others for a webinar on Wednesday, December 3rd, to discuss who the heroes of today's economic crisis might be and what qualities they'll need to succeed. And, unlike most off-the-shelf PR/crisis communications webinars, this one will be truly broad in scope.

Webinar panelists will include executives from KRW International, a leadership consulting firm that does two things very well: helping a client motivate the survivors of a downturn while nurturing next generation superstars, a tall order in these days of doom and gloom. We'll also have a leader from the Reputation Institute and one of their clients, a small pharmaceutical company called Johnson & Johnson. They'll discuss best practices for maintaining and even growing an organization's reputation in times of crises. Mix in Peppercom's battle-tested acumen in digital crisis communications and one has a very, very different strategic discussion.

I hope you'll join the dialogue. It's definitely not your grandfather's crisis communications 101 webinar. And, it promises to describe, if not identify by name, who will likely become the heroes and villains of 2009.