Last month the Yahoo! Business and Human Rights Program convened a 'User First' meeting aimed at tech start-ups to educate them about the challenges to privacy and free speech they will inevitably face. I moderated a panel on lessons from companies who had faced such challenges. Speakers included Tumblr...Skype [part of Microsoft]...Yahoo!...and CloudFlare...The takeaways for companies: 1. The question is not 'whether,' but 'when.' Assume that your company will get caught up in a crisis when you least expect it. All of the crises were triggered by third parties... 2. Clarify your core mission and customers. For all of the companies, the challenge triggered deep discussions about their most fundamental values... 3. Have policies and procedures in place... 4. Err on the side of transparency, internal and external... Companies of every size and stage should prepare themselves; the Global Network Initiative, the U.N. Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, and BSR...all provide useful guidance...