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Common Emergency Plan Errors

Four common errors are written into many emergency and disaster recovery plans. Most emergency plans that fail have one or more of these four major flaws.

Regular Contingency Planning Tasks

An effective Emergency Plan has accurate directions for quickly assessing damage, quickly dispatching resources to needed locations and minimizing congestion. To provide effective emergency plans:

•  Regularly re-examine all aspects of emergency preparedness
•  Regularly re-define the role of emergency operating centers
•  Regularly re-train employees
•  Regularly test employees capabilities
•  Ensure emergency drills closely depict real-life crises
•  Regularly update contingency plans

The four common flaws in contingency plans are:

1. Plan is not organized
2. Plan format is too complex
3. Plan is generic or too detailed
4. Alternates are not identified or not accurate

1. Plan is not organized

Poorly documented disaster planning may be worse than useless. In a crisis, people may waste valuable time searching for critical information.

Does a plan provide essential information for each crisis? Or is the document just a jumbled mixture of information from many sources?

• Assemble essential information for the right people in the right sequence
• Organize information in a logical flow of how it will be used in a crisis
• Ensure that copies of the plan are readily available to all managers
• Keep information that is used only for planning in a separate location

Company size determines how many documents are needed. A small organization in one location may only need a single document that contains all emergency information. A large company with multiple locations needs an executive document, a company plan and supportive contingency plans.

Executive Document

An executive document can inform upper management what to do immediately in a crisis. It should identify who is responsible for what and include duplicate removable information pages of telephone numbers and alternate contact information for key contacts.

Emergency Plan

An Emergency Plan should provide key policies about generic disasters. Executives can use it to organize and plan long-term recovery efforts. An Emergency Plan should create a clear picture of how the organization will respond to generic disasters.

Contingency Plans

Each contingency plan should provide key policies about specific disasters. Executives can use them to coordinate emergency actions as a basis for recovery efforts. Each contingency plan should define a specific algorithm of "who to contact" and "who does what" while listing all alternate people and alternate actions appropriate to the defined crisis.

2. Emergency Plan is too complex

Electronic tools used to generating emergency plans can increase confusion in a disaster. Important questions are:

• What knowledge is required to access the emergency planning documents?
• Will computers be accessible to those who need them?
• Will the applications that view the plans be running?
• Will current versions of the documents be available?
• Will emergency staff know how to find what they need in documents created by other people?
• Have all key people rehearsed the plans?

Store off-site, easily accessible paper copies of current emergency plans.

3. Plan is too generic or too detailed

Generic emergency plans may look good on paper. But a generic plan based on false or incomplete assumptions will fail in a disaster. Although a generic plan may be a useful planning tool, it must be carefully scrutinized by all stakeholders and tested regularly to ensure that it is effective.

• Overly detailed plans can be troublesome in a disaster
• The true “worst case” scenario may not have been identified
• Emergency plans document critical functions in too much detail

A real disaster will rarely be an exact match an anticipated disaster, so any plan will probably have serious gaps. Therefore, when planning, focus on the worst case scenario.

4. Are alternates accurately identified?

A disaster recovery plan becomes out of date, with changes in personnel, vendors and clients. A disaster recovery plan should continually validate contact information for essential staff, and provide alternate means for reaching them should the primary contact fail.

• In a crisis, many people will try to contact managers and operators
• Expect communication networks to become jammed
• List alternate telephone numbers, and those of people designated as their alternates
• Consider alternative ways to contact people in the event of no electricity, no telephone service and/or no internet

Nightmare Scenario

Imagine yourself managing a major disaster recovery effort using an emergency plan with the above errors!

Before that happens - check each contingency plan for these common errors and help minimize your organization’s risk - and your personal risk of losing your job. Create effective recovery plans!

 

Martyn Carruthers was a medical technician and served on Royal Navy nuclear submarines during the Cold War. He was health physics and safety officer at English and Canadian nuclear power stations, and Radiation Protection Officer for the Canadian government, where he worked with Public Health and Emergency Measures organizations. Martyn also founded Soulwork Solutions, a complete system of coaching and mentorship.

Emergency Training

Crisis Recovery

• Emergency Preparedness
• Contingency Exercises
• Crisis Management
• Dealing with Trauma and PTSD
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• Developing an Overall Emergency Plan
• Controlling each crisis
• Testing Contingency Plans
• Maintaining Contingency Plans
• Emergency Training