Perspectives | Business Continuity Management

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Business Continuity Management

Douglas H. Hartman, ARM

November 15, 2001 - New York City. Monthly breakfast meeting of the New York Chapter of the Risk and Insurance Management Society. Moderator: Patrick Hurley, Insurance Manager of Consolidated Edison.

The theme of this month's meeting was how to prepare a plan in case of a fire, terrorist bomb or biological contamination or a natural disaster. The speakers' focus was not on computers and buildings but on the enterprise's most crucial asset, its employees. The terrorist attack on the World Trade Centers and the anthrax incidents that followed provided vivid examples of what can go wrong - as well as what worked. Sadly, these recent events have underlined the importance of planning for the next incident.

Marc Brodt, Manager of Property Loss Prevention and Control of the Colgate-Palmolive Company, outlined the new measures being implemented to protect their employees. "The value of people is paramount," he said. Their new program, which is being lead by a senior executive, is designed around the well being of its employees.

"Keeping Safe and Connected"

—Continuity Initiatives at Colgate-Palmolive

  • Assign capable floor leaders - people who will keep everyone connected - because the volunteers you now have assigned as floor wardens and body searchers may not be the most capable.
  • Conduct full-scale evacuation drills with roll calls - because fire drills mandated by city ordinances may not be adequate.
  • Set up an 800 number with a recorded message for employees and relatives to call for information - because the company switchboard may get tied up or become disabled.
  • Establish contingency plans to "hotel" your employees - because they may not be able to go home and they will need to be told where to go to work the next day.
  • Publish disaster response information on your Web site - to alleviate the load on telephone lines.
  • Implement an Employee Emergency Data extra net site that will provide employees, loved ones, disaster recovery personnel and other authorized persons access to employee emergency profiles -- because HR people may not be unable to bring printouts or floppy diskettes with them as they evacuate.
  • Isolate the "Top Guy" - so that he or she can receive reports from various sources, analyze, think and make decisions.

 

 

Glenn Buser, Managing Director and the Operations & Asset Management Practice Leader of Marsh USA Inc., observed that "A disaster is a terrible time to test your plan." He urged risk managers to "rethink" their contingency plans. For example, is the selected recovery site too close by? Assess your recovery capabilities and look for "gaps between what management wants and what we are capable of doing."

Alex Solis, Senior Business Risk Consultant of FM Global, emphasized the importance of pre-planning and establishment of a chain of command. In conversation afterwards, George J. Browne, Manager, Commercial Services for Global Risk Consultants Corp, a consultant to Colgate-Palmolive, kindly outlined for me the five elements of the Incident Command System.

Incident Command System Elements

  • Command - Somebody has to be put in charge
  • Operations - Doers to resume essential tasks
  • Planning - Thinkers adjust plans to the circumstances
  • Logistics - Gatherers to get space, supplies, etc.
  • Finance - To track and pay for recovery cost

The speakers mentioned hot-sites, cold sites, off-premises data storage and data restoration, but on this morning everyone was mainly thinking and talking about the safety of people.