Lauren,
You are correct in your conclusion that it may not be possible to be completely prepared for a crisis. The key to crisis managment is to consider what are the potentials for crisis with your business operations. Your considerations would include natural disasters from hurricanes, tornadoes, bilizzards, floods, earthquakes etc. In addition to natural disasters comes economic downfalls with national retail sales, bank failures, credit availability to meet payroll, product recall, consumer image of product etc. One more would be poor publicity about your company, business or product.
Each of the above mentioned potentials can and are dangerous if you don't have a plan to counter the impact. The competent manager considers the outcomes of each of these crisis and makes a list of the potential outcomes from each event. From these events the management team brainstorms the action items necessary to combat the influence of these crisis. It is not always possible to rectify the cirisis completely but the plan can lessen its impact and build a foundation for recovery. All the potentials need to be discussed and how the recovery would work to lessen the blow to your customers and business.
Once you have brainstormed your potential issues and solutions for the plan it should be written and read by all managers. In the absence of a main manager any other manager could pick up from the written plan. I suggest the plan be revisited monthly to entertain othe ideas and solutions.
Considerations for communications to employees for business as usual activity, public relations responses for news media and consumers will get people in the need to know on the right track to contribute to the recovery process. Each business should have relationships with police, fire departments and local hospitals.
No plan can be full proof but having a plan reduces the potential for panic. You can approach the situation with a plan and keep in mind your plan can be adjusted on the fly with the current conditions.
I hope this helps with your question Lauren!
It has been a pleasure discussing the crisis plan idea.
Dr. Carlson
To a certain extent I think it is definitely possible to plan for a crisis situation. However, I do not think it is always going to be possible. Some crises are unavoidable and cannot be planned for.
