subject: Crisis Management and Business Continuity [print this page] Crisis Management and Business Continuity
In the last couple of months the world has been mesmerized by the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. The accident occurred in the deepwater horizon platform owned by BP, which led to oil leaking into the Gulf for 3 months unchecked. The damage caused to the environment, the local economy and to BP will take years if not decades to recover from.
What happened? Where did BP go wrong?
This kind of tragedy is not unique to BP but it revealed a major flaw in BP's operational processes; BP failed to show that they had effective systems in place to deal with a crisis. If BP had taken a stock of what happened to Exxon on March 24, 1989 when Exxon Valdez ran aground in Alaska Prince William Sound, they would have been better equipped to deal with the issues. History is a solid prophet of the future!
From the BP experience ,we can see that successful companies are not the ones without a record of disasters but those that can prove they are adequately prepared to deal with any emergency.Preparing for crisisshould become top of the mind concern for organizations. Companies must stop adopting "it cannot happen to us" approach because crisis is inevitable and no one can say when it would occur. Theyshouldinstead put in place a strategic plan that could adequately deal with possible/envisaged disasters.The strategy to deal with such events should be subjected to review periodically. Sounds like aluxury doesnt it ? but it is not !!! Awell structured crisis management planshowing the arrangement management has put in place andmeasures taken to solve problems when crisis hits an organization isessential for the continuity of thatusiness.
The most challenging part of crisis management today is the social media. When something does go viral on the web, it is overwhelming and scary to see how fast it spreads. Because the crowd controls the conversation, You tube, Facebook, Myspace and Twitter and not the conventional media have become the biggest threat to organizations. While they are excellent marketing tool and are being used by organizations to promote their goods and services, they have been discovered to be effective tool in the hands of competitors when crisis eventually erupts. Companies that are looking to exist in the long term need to pay attention to social media mentions of their brands, services and even their top management. This should be done regularly; in order to respond to any negative circumstances should it arise. It is an organization's responsibility to turn negative comments (if any) around and defend them as soon as possible. It is the silence and non action that in most cases, result to embarrassment and possible litigation for organizations (remember the United Airlines case?). If there is no response on Twitter or Facebook one hour after a story breaks, it shows clearly that an organisation is not adequately prepared to deal with social media crises. Unfortunately very few companies are yet to identify their communications on the social media.
In preparing a crisis management plan,the guidelines must be taken.
Take a look at the crisis whether large or small that has affected theorganization in the last ten years.
Take into consideration what can happen to a company at any point in time. Things such as workplace violence, terrorism, kidnapping, fire, HR issues, IT failure, internal fraud, death of staff etc.
Play the "what if" game and constitute problems that could happen.
Assign responsibilities to staff so every body knows who is responsible for dealing with such issues.
Test and re test the crisis management plan.
Finally don't forget to recruit an online crisis manager!
