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Scenario: phase 5
Communications
and analysis
Emergency
management
SICAT info.
dissemination
PR/HR info.
dissemination
General
status line
Email
Press
releases
Web page
Newsletters
Intranet
Displaced staff
Figure 18.13
Scenario:
phase 5
Business units
activating BCPs
Media
Newsletters
stakeholders. If you have had to face the
media before this point you have been able to
say with some confidence that your organization
has plans in place to deal with any disruptive
situation and that those plans have
been activated. Now you are armed with an
approved strategy to deal with this particular
situation which you can show is being managed
– not just reacted to. The bank works to
checklists that have been developed through
experience. Several methods are used – all
using the same source, namely corporate
communication and PR interfaces with the
media. For a prolonged outage, human
resource management will interface with staff,
including those who have been told to stay at
home. Meanwhile the communications and
analysis team is interfacing with the business
units making sure that they are kept abreast of
what is going on, using predetermined guidelines
(Figure 18.13).
The remaining four phases deal with the
management and control of a prolonged
outage, the return to normal and debriefing.
All are important but the crucial communication
element continues to maintain, monitor
and prioritize relations with all stakeholders.
Organizations are conscious of the importance
of business continuity capability to cope
with increasing numbers of business disrupting
incidents.
Scotiabank found that individual plans are
not enough. Responses must be co-ordinated
and that depends on excellent communication.
Many organizations put such a capability
in for Y2K only to abandon it afterwards.
Best practice
Corporate communicators realize that recovery
demands that all stakeholders know about
it and the organization must go beyond
damage limitation if it is to profit from any
disasters afterwards. The lesson learned is that
strategic communication strategy is only as
valuable as the organization’s culture and
capacity to cope functionally during a disaster.
© 2004 Sandra Oliver for editorial matter and selection;
individual chapters, the contributors