Crisis Command and Control Centre Planning

A crisis can take on many forms such as industrial accidents where a number of people are affected, plant damaged and construction sites affected. Natural risks such as fires, earthquakes, etc. can also result in a crisis. Additionally a crisis can be as a result of man made risks such as air or water pollution, toxic waste spills, collapses, etc. The other risk that can and normally does result in a crisis is the threats associated with terrorist.

Protecting the company's reputation, commercial viability, employees and other key business assets and stakeholders in the face of extreme, complex, unpredictable, and constantly changing risks is an ongoing challenge that can only be effectively done if one is appropriately prepared.

The creation of an emergency response management plan to deal with these treats involves developing a three phase strategy that will indicate how a company and its affiliates should respond to a crisis. The preparation should also include the creation of appropriate infrastructure for the purpose.

The development and construction of an emergency response management plan and infrastructure will give a company a competitive advantage by protecting their reputation, key business assets, employees and other stakeholders. This however is an ongoing challenge that can only be sufficiently dealt with if the company is appropriately prepared. To wait until a crisis occurs could be disastrous to the continued existence of the company and is much more expensive than investing in developing and constructing a complete solution that includes plans and infrastructure to deal with it when it happens.

A complete solution includes components that addresses strategic as well as tactical requirement. The ideal crisis management system should cover the three main phases of a crisis situation. These are:

• crisis prevention
• crisis management
• crisis recovery

The preparation and planning needs to be comprehensive, consistent and integrated in order to ensure an efficient plan that will be able to be invoked successfully when the crisis hits.

The company's executive team will be responsible for all aspects of a response to a crisis. This will include developing incident objectives, providing suitable and sufficient plans and infrastructure and managing all incident operations to bring the crisis under control and implement the strategies to return to normality.

The crisis management plan and infrastructure needs to be able to be sufficient to deal with all three phases of the crisis. This includes the following:

Before the crisis (crisis prevention)

The systems and infrastructure should be able to collect and process data on a ongoing basis allowing for the monitoring of potential disasters in order to warn management when predefined criteria or warning levels are reached that could indicate a crisis is imminent. Critical data should be analyzed constantly and any unusual trend should be detected and when analysis indicates that a crisis is anticipated management should be alerted. This should also be the point when the general alert level is adjusted and published in the company. The information should include security, safety and health items as well as the interaction of these issues. The focus areas should include at least people, buildings, plant, systems and processes.

During the crisis (crisis management)The key to managing a crisis once it hit a company is to have a dedicated crisis command and control center.

The crisis command and control centre serves as a secure location from where the company's executives who is responsible for the strategic resolution of the crisis can obtain a big picture to evaluate and provide direction to the crisis site.

The primary functions of the executive team during an emergency are to collect, gather and analyze data, make decisions that protect life and property, maintain continuity of the company within the scope of applicable directives and communicate the decisions to all concerned.

The crisis command and control centreThe crisis command and control centre should be equipped with the following items:

• The physical structure should be sound and comply with good building standards and should not be constructed in a place where it has an outside wall.
• The air conditioning, fire detection and protection systems as well as the computer installations contained in the crisis command and control centre should comply with standards that require them to be independent of other systems to prevent them from being affected by an on site crisis.
• The crisis command and control centre must be for the exclusive use during a crisis and should not be used for any other general purpose in the absence of a crisis.
• A standby power generator that will automatically kick in and should have a capacity and reliability that will ensure sufficient power to all communication, data and lighting requirements even in cases where there is a total power failure for a long duration of time.
• Secure access control that will allow only authorized staff to enter should be ensured.
• Visual display units that are connected to a communication system that will allow the company executive team to be able to visually follow the development of the crisis from the crisis control room.
• Suitable, reliable and secure communications systems that can be used to communicate with the crisis site as well as government agencies and other interested and affected parties should be in place.
• A speaker system attached to communication devises that will allow a team approach in communication is a necessity.
• An independent secure fax machine is a must.
• A recording system that records all voice communication into and out of the crisis command and control centre should be installed and records should be kept for a period of at least 12 months after any activity in the centre.
• A suitable number of desks, tables and lockable cupboards should permanently furnish the crisis command and control centre.
• Copies of all sites based emergency response plans of the company and its affiliate must be available in the centre. These plans should include sections on emergency contact details, duty rosters and emergency team member information.
• A planning board where staff allocated specific tasks in relation to the emergency organization should be available and display updated information.
• A cupboard that contains the appropriate identification insignia to clearly identify the roles of all the staff present in the control room should be included in the centre.
• A dedicated copier for the sole use during a crisis is necessary.
• A crisis log book where a scribe can record the activities taking place during the crisis.

After the crisis (crisis recovery)

The crisis control plan should include a requirement to develop and implement a crisis recovery strategy once the crisis has been brought under practical control.

ConclusionAny amount of planning cannot prevent all emergencies. It is however a fact that with the appropriate plan and infrastructure in place the impact and consequences of emergencies can be drastically reduces. It should be noted that a crisis command and control centre that is not supported with a suitable and sufficient emergency response plan that is based on a formal threat assessment could provide a false sense of security.

© Carl Marx 2009