Crisis Management Planning

The purpose of creating a formal Crisis Management Plan is to prepare the organization both technically, physically and emotionally to handle a crisis. Crisis Management preparedness procedures are developed so that the impact of any crisis on the employees, products, services and company operations can be minimized. A business organization, with a formal Crisis Management Plan, is much better prepared to minimize and manage the panic and confusion that occurs during and after a crisis.

 For each operational system, adequate plans should be made and precautions taken to ensure that all operations can adequately recover from disruption and damage caused by a crisis event.  No plan can address every possible conceivable disaster or emergency. One of the main purposes is to create a Crisis Management plan which will have sufficient flexibility to meet any disaster or emergency condition promptly and effectively as well as establish a corporate team mentality around the recovery process.

 A thorough analysis should occur that defines the critical business functions and processes that if interrupted would cause substantial harm to the business. The identification of these Level 1 functions and the time frames that surround the loss of the ability to perform these functions forms the basis for the Emergency Management Team to declare a disaster and what internal and external teams should be mobilized. This step will also define the company personnel who are part of the Emergency Management Team and their roles and decision authority levels so that is clear who has the authority to make a disaster declaration.

Team should be defined consisting of employees an/or contractors and their roles and responsibilities and activities they need to complete in the event of a crisis event. For the purpose of Crisis Management Planning, the teams are generally as follows:

• Emergency Management Team

• Office Facilities Team

• Computer Network Hardware / Software Team

• Records Management Team

The concept of dividing the staff, consultants, contractor’s and suppliers into specialty teams is the most effective way is to leverage the existing expertise and knowledge of the staff, consultants, contractor’s and suppliers to effect an orderly and timely recovery. As a for instance, in a smaller company there is often a person that is responsible to call repair people to fix such things as an air conditioner failure. This person normally already has a list of 3^rd parties to call for repair. In preparing a Crisis Management plan it is generally practical to have this person be responsible for that same area and simply document the tasks, contacts and decisions that need to be completed thereby providing the basis of a plan for that particular area.

A Crisis Management Plan should contains the critical decision tree which will allow the Emergency Management Team to make critical business decisions and activate appropriate portions of the plan that address the crisis thereby protecting the people, assets and business operation of the company. It is important that the teams be established and the activities to be done before during and after a disaster, be set and that all team members are familiar with their duties. The plan should contain sections for each team with tasks and activities and processes to follow. Below is a Sample of some team roles and responsibilities that a plan should contain.

Emergency Management Team Roles / Responsibilities

•  Invoke Crisis Management Plan

• Communicate Status to Executive Management and Board

• Communicate Status to Team Leaders and Employees

• Control Media Communication

• Identify Command Center

• Approve Recovery Expenditures

Office & Facilities Team Roles / Responsibilities

• Assess Damage to Facility

• Coordinate Activities with Property Management Company

• Communicate Status to Emergency Management Team

• Provide Office Supplies For Command Center

• Manage logistics of move to Temporary Facility

A test of the computer network & services recovery should be conducted as part of any continuity planning process. This includes a review of existing system backup strategies and schedules as well as the test itself to recover existing application software and data. Executing a test of the Crisis Management Plan in this area is a critical step in the crisis management process because of the differences in the hardware and software architecture that is used by different businesses.

In addition, computer network recovery subscription service should be contracted  Subscription to this type of service provides a facility and the computer hardware and technical personnel necessary to recover their computer network in the case of a crisis event. This service also gives the business the capability to resume operations utilizing the data center equipment until they have secured the replacement of computer equipment that was either damaged or destroyed by a facility or computer disruption.

Crisis management planning is a critical component of any business just as insurance for these disaster is as well. With proper planning and preparation your business can survive the next crisis it faces.

Let Result Resources help you create a Crisis Management plan for your business. We offer full planning, testing and facilities hosting solutions for business large and small.