Born To Be Wild

Category: Crisis Management

  • Organisations Under Pressure: Leading in a Crisis

    Organisations Under Pressure: Leading in a Crisis

    Compared to business as usual, a crisis presents a unique and challenging decision-making environment. Whether it’s a natural disaster, hostage scenario, malware attack or other crisis, leaders and team members may be under enormous psychological pressure when managing a major incident. In such extremes, strategic leadership is crucial, particularly as the leader is unlikely to have had direct experience of the crisis beforehand.

    Two different leadership styles

    There are two different leadership styles that may apply when managing a major incident. These being task-orientated and people-centred leadership. Neither one of these leadership styles outweighs the other in importance. Instead, depending on the crisis and incident, the appropriate leadership style will need to be invoked.

    The task-orientated leadership style is focused on strong hierarchies and task-orientated behaviour to drive outcomes. This leadership style takes command and control of the situation by determining specific tasks and scope of work for their alternates. She or he determines what, how, where and when the work must be done.

    The people-centred leadership style places greater emphasis on their relationship with their team members, encourages two-way communication and harnesses ideas from the team. Employees often open up to leaders who are human, who have made mistakes and learned from them. ‘When you capture the hearts and minds of people, let them have their say in some of the decisions, they will have greater buy-in and be more willing to strive for excellence,’ says Melbourne RiskLogic Senior Manager, Gary Vogel.

    Choosing the best crisis leadership style for your organisation

    Crises are unpredictable, chaotic and can escalate quickly. Leaders must deal with issues that are difficult to understand and which seriously threaten the viability of the organisation and possibly even the safety and welfare of staff and clients or customers. ‘During a crisis, people are often panicky and in need of assurance that someone strong is in control. Task-orientated leadership using the command and control approach has been used effectively in these situations as it provides strength, helps assure the team, and galvanises their efforts,’ confirms Vogel.

    An inspirational leader is one who quickly, calmly and decisively controls a crisis situation

     

    ‘With great power comes great responsibility, and managers are expected to lead – especially through times of difficulty. A good leader will change their leadership style based on the situation,’ adds RiskLogic’s Brisbane Regional Manager, Simon Petie.

    A people-centric leadership style may well be better placed for the business as usual environment, or when reviewing and learning from the crisis and preparing for the next one. For a people-centered leadership approach to be effective during the crisis, the workforce must be fully aligned in its values, direction and drive for success.

    ‘The maturity of the crisis management team is a critical consideration in terms of how the leader leads during a crisis,’ says RiskLogic’ Melbourne Regional Manager, Cheryl Hambly ‘If the team has extensive experience working together in crisis mode, the leader may be able to take a more supportive rather than directive role. However, in reality, this may be difficult to achieve. In a less mature team, as is often the case, team members will need a higher level of direction to set objectives and respond to the situation,’ adds Hambly.

    In a crisis, there is often simply no time to consult with the team about what to do. If you hesitate as a leader, if you delay a decision in order to form a committee to discuss your options, you may miss the decisive point that will tip the balance between success and failure, or possibly even life and death.

    Becoming a resilient organisation

    To be a resilient organisation, leaders must be able to adapt to and successfully steer the organisation through all kinds of disruptive changes. It’s not enough to simply train your managers to be decisive or to tell your staff the location of emergency exits and assembly points.

    If the command and control leadership approach is counter to your organisation’s typical approach, working through times of stress and challenge may be exceptionally difficult. Leadership in a crisis might not be within the skill-set of your organisation’s senior leaders – a leader who is highly successful in normal business may not be able to lead well in a crisis.

    The only practical way of preparing leaders for a crisis is a rigorous, realistic and regular training program, which allows leaders to examine all the implications of those challenging, yet plausible ‘What if…?’ scenarios. Key employees need to be trained to work within the crisis management plan to help ensure they respond in the most appropriate way. A well-managed communications strategy that ensures accurate and timely communication is also critical to instil calmness, authority and confidence in all those affected by the crisis.

    RiskLogic has spent over a decade piecing together the perfect solutions for organisational leaders to remain in control during a crisis and understand the best leadership style during a crisis, you can read more about this here in our CQ Leadership Package. 

    Contact Us today to learn more

  • The Buzz Word: Denial

    The Buzz Word: Denial

    It took two massive earthquakes to wake up New Zealand to the realities of natural disasters. Almost all professionals we meet, share the same key worry surrounding earthquakes impacting their business, despite the ever-present threat of cyber-attacks, supply chain issues and loss of key staff.

    So, if another event of such magnitude is front and centre in professionals’ minds, why do businesses still fail to prepare? Day three perhaps may have answered this; denial.

    Christchurch

    The group were asked to describe some of the barriers to embedding Business Continuity (BC) within their organisation. The key word appearing was “denial”.

    Denial is usually part of a more complex reason, but ultimately, it’s key stakeholders finding any excuse to keep the Business Continuity Plan (BCP) at the bottom of the in-tray.

    Many businesses in Christchurch showed exceptional resilience by getting through two major events. They have found ways to crawl out of the rubble and rebuild to continue operating. So, why would they ever need a BCP?

    RiskLogic and Aon put the question back on the open floor discussion that morning.

    “We have to get realistic though”. During the 2011 events, there was an understanding and level of support from external parties and key stakeholders. Businesses accepted that invoices or services were going to be delayed. Everyone seemed to be in it together, and no one was to blame. However, if it was just your business that had an isolated event, like a cyber attack or reputational incident. Will those key stakeholders or clients be so understanding? Especially if your business has no BCP to use in a recovery effort.

    Thankfully though, all our delegates were committed to insurance and BC. Unfortunately, they’ve learnt just like all of us that it’s rare for other professionals to be as committed to it.

    What are some of the major barriers to constructing a thorough BCP that will help your business get through in times of crisis?

    • Use research information to demonstrate the likely threats, like the Global Economic forum report.
    • Gather data on similar businesses that have an outage that you can relate back to your own business.
    • Run BC awareness sessions at your company at every opportunity, like during evacuation drills.
    • Talk to your insurance brokers about being rewarded through premiums for having good resilience plans in place and demonstrate this back to Senior Leadership.

    Rounding it up

    After three great days across New Zealand, Aon and RiskLogic were fortunate enough to meet and support some of the most passionate professionals this country has to offer. Being able to discuss face to face what changes will come in 2019 and providing solutions to this is what makes our country so unique on a global scale.

    The insurance market has never been so hard, we all must work together to make sure we are going to get insured for the future. The insurance companies aren’t just playing hardball, 40 billion dollars in natural disaster payouts occurred in NZ in 2017 alone! They, like us, need to make a profit, because if they don’t, they will disappear. If that happens, then no one will have insurance…

    We don’t envisage the Aon and RiskLogic partnership stopping here. Discussions are already underway on how we can provide more world-class content and resources throughout 2019; providing more opportunities for professionals to attend seminars and obtain unique advice to help organisations get through in times of crisis.

    If you don’t want to wait for that to happen, you can email us direct now to begin discussions on an insurance & continuity plan that will put you at the forefront of resiliency.

    Email here: info@risklogic.co.nz

    Contact Us Now

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  • Mass Supply Chain Issues | A German Case Study

    Mass Supply Chain Issues | A German Case Study

    When you think of drought, Africa, South America or the Middle East usually springs to mind. It’s unlikely Germany resides in this list. However, this year marks its worst drought on record.

    If you know anything about Germany, you know that their two favourite things are fantastic beer and delicious potatoes.

    You could understand my surprise when I learnt the price difference in potatoes and beer. It was cheaper for us to fill up on thick wheat beer than a high-carb vegetable. After some research, I found out that Germany had recorded their hottest summer on record this year, which has contributed to extreme impacts on the farming industry.

    Emsland Group, a potato processor with seven production plants spread throughout Germany, has announced their worst year of product numbers. This has directly affected their suppliers, clients and resellers.

    It’s easy to forget that potatoes are not just something that accompanies your grandmothers’ delicious roasts. Emsland Group reports that Potato Starch, Protein and Fibre, Potato Flakes, and Potato Granules make up over 60% of their order list, while potato chips take up the remaining 40%.

    Interestingly, New Zealand saw an almost identical crisis last Christmas when news broke of depleting potatoes supplies. Pack n’ Save became the first supermarket to run at critically low levels of potato chips, while news reports urged people to “stock up now” before the holidays.

    For these suppliers, raising prices does not and cannot happen immediately. For the German suppliers, they forecast and schedule a price increase for late 2019 as a result of this year’s drought. This means not only are customers affected by lack of produce, they are also affected by price increases over the next 12 months.

    Fortunately for the Emsland Group, a plan had been put in place prior to this crisis. One they actioned upon once warnings of a 2018 drought became known. They named it the Emsland Group Assurance model.

    In a nutshell, this model supported growers by offsetting a portion of the damage incurred from the drought. Emsland Group offered growers a drought subsidy and also provided incentives to deliver as much raw material as possible. Therefore, they could maintain effective relationships with their major clients and suppliers simultaneously.

    However, a spokesperson from Emsland Group said that “we cannot keep these incentives up in the future. We must find a new way to combat drought or set customer expectations”. She acknowledged that many of their resellers were becoming increasingly concerned of the future of the product.

    There is likely a discussion occurring between stakeholders regarding climate concerns, but we’ll leave that to the experts. The conversation here is being prepared whether you believe in it or not. A supply chain issue (whether you are the supply chain or rely on them) is the crisis to avoid.

    For Emsland Group, they had a plan that they initiated. But they’ve recognised that by 2019, it will be out of date and they are likely working on plan B. This is important and is often forgotten in large organisations where many gatekeepers are found.

    As important as your Supply Chain Plan is, it will change every year (at the least). Emsland Group knew their farmers and they had a handle on fulfilment numbers, but this will change next year.

    You must use this example as an excuse to check your own procedures. RiskLogic encourages you to think out of the box. You may have nothing to do with the agriculture industry, but it’s guaranteed you rely on suppliers to operate.

    Suppliers could be a telecommunication network, a rented/shared office space, online storage…the list goes on. If any one of these were to go down or cease to exist without warning, what are your plans? Could you get back to Business as Usual as quickly as possible?

  • Stimulating Interest Before a Crisis Event

    Stimulating Interest Before a Crisis Event

    On the 30th of October, New Zealand was again rocked by a 6.2 earthquake south-west of Taumaranui. This is nothing unusual for a Cantabrian, but my hotel in Wellington swaying and rolling certainly caused some beads of sweat.

    A few hours later after my first meeting of the day, a contact calls me up to give an update on his two-year Crisis Management journey.

    Referring to his CEO, this contact had spent the better part of two years simply trying to get sign off on a company-wide, online Crisis Management Solution. It was a 6.2 earthquake only 200kms away that finally initiated interest.

    I guarantee I’m not the only one who had this conversation on the 30th. In fact, you can see a genuine spike in password updates and McAfee/SAP subscriptions after a major cyber-attack like the WannaCry Ransomware attack in May 2017.

    We shouldn’t be using an event as an excuse to investigate business disruption programs, but it can take a significant event to stimulate interest, that unfortunately will never change.

    If by chance your CEO didn’t arrange a meeting after the 30th October’s earthquake, did you take it upon yourself to arrange one anyway? Although I don’t recommend waiting until an event, it is a perfect time to revisit the programs you want to implement and encourage interest to the next level.

    The trap to avoid is when your executive team is only inspired to act post-event. RiskLogic often sees organisations doing three things:

    1.     Leaving their crisis team in the docks until it’s too late,

    2.    assuming if we’re in a crisis it’s too late,

    3.    failing to over-escalate followed by rapid de-escalation during an event.

    The proven way around this is through training & exercising. Get your response team in a safe environment, practice the steps and prove your point around the importance of preparedness.

    During the meeting

    My contact finally got the call and was ready; she’d been waiting for this moment for a long time. We had discussed six months ago that the best way to make this meeting count was to essentially go in with a prepared proposal.

    During the period where you’re not getting the call-up, you should be arranging all of that. Your job is to do this in-between events and ensure it’s seamless for when it needs reviewing and actioning. I know how hard it is to generate interest in this subject, but as resilience specialist, it’s our job to highlight the risks, all the time, not just post event to the leadership team.

    Make it so straightforward, it’s impossible not to move forward on it.

    There are other threats outside of EQs

    Yes, believe it or not, New Zealand has other major crisis events that occur all of the time. The most common being cyber-attacks. They are silent killers for organisations and often go unnoticed until it’s far too late.

    If you’re subjected to a major cyber attack and fail to have plans in place, it’s highly unlikely your insurance provider will pay out for your lack of preparation. Even with something we can’t help, like natural disasters, insurance providers may fail to compensate you in the future. As I have mentioned in a previous article the insurance landscape is changing.

    If you can get the chance of that meeting with your CEO, make it count, they don’t come around too often. Highlight the risks to them now, not post event, take action and get prepared.

    Until next time, plan, do, check & act…

  • Were Manufacturers Ready For This Crisis?

    Were Manufacturers Ready For This Crisis?

     

    Manufacturers resilience incident management (more…)

  • The Human Impact of a Crisis

    The Human Impact of a Crisis

    Media and society encourage us to think more about the economic and structural damage of a crisis, than the human impact. It’s only natural that when coverage of a major event – like the Beirut explosion – occurs, we soon forget about the human impact this would have had on those people. As awful as it is, something new takes over the coverage and we navigate this instead.

    In your organisation, a similar mindset will severely damage your culture and output.

    More and more team leaders are considering how they look after their people than the administration of their business – which is a good thing. But, there are things to identify in this approach.

    Types of Crisis Events

    To better understand how employees are likely to react in a crisis, we need to look at the different types of crisis events that they may be exposed to. Incidents can be categorised into the following four types of events:

    Natural Disasters vs Man-Made

    Man-made

    A natural disaster, like the 2011 Christchurch Earthquakes, can bring about injury or even death to personnel or damage and destruction to an organisations infrastructure. In the Christchurch Earthquake, this was certainly the case.

    There may also be an act of violence or hostility perpetrated by a single individual against an organisation, it’s personnel and it’s property. Let’s imagine that the incident above was a result of a violent act by an individual and not an act of nature. A lone gunman who walks into a place of work and shoots randomly with the same results or worse. The human reaction to either event is extremely distressing; however, one can speculate that the tendency of people is to see acts of nature as just that – therefore the reaction is usually one of grief, sadness, questioning of – or returning to faith. In contrast, in an incident involving acts of violence, there are often all of the above, but also accompanied by anger, anxiety, apprehension about safety and security, etc.

    When the March 15th shooting occurred in Christchurch, the following week so many organisations relocate their staff and consider work-from-home policies.

    To make things worse is a tendency for the media to be more involved in an act of violence rather than if the incident had been an Earthquake or weather event. The runtime for the story is protracted involving stories about the perpetrators family, the victim’s family and similar incidents. You would struggle to find any news on the significant Argentinian fires (that currently outsize that of Australia’s last year).

    During natural disasters, an entire city or region may be affected, and people often bond together within communities, this was very evident during the Christchurch Earthquake. In contrast, where man-made events occur within a single organisation, there may be a sense of isolation from the community as people may feel some guilt by association – like a cyber attack or fire for example. It often feels like the world “keeps going” while theirs has stopped. There is a feeling of them and us, the people directly affected and the bystanders.

    Passive vs Active Trauma

    Passive Trauma is an actual injury, assault, loss of a job, crisis, medical procedure etc. Passive trauma is more in line with physical or emotional neglect. Someone not responding to your trauma, not providing support or just not registering your trauma.

    Immediately after 9/11, many organisations experienced the fall out of passive and active trauma for its staff. There are case studies of businesses having a well-conceived Business Continuity plan with documented recovery procedures that still failed due to not addressing the human impact (in this catastrophic event, exceptions could be made).

    Soon after the attack, companies had managed to evacuate all staff and invoke a business continuity plan. Part of that plan was to relocate staff to new offices, usually out of state.

    In the coming weeks when staff relocated an unexpected culture was being reported nationally. Although the staff at the alternate office were part of the same company and sympathetic, there soon developed a “them and us” status. The staff who had been directly impacted by being in New York City that day struggled to mix and work with the staff who had watched it all on TV. The new office environments didn’t work.

    Let’s be honest, could you work with someone who had gone through such trauma Monday to Friday, for the foreseeable future? It would take an emotional toll on anyone and be a constant elephant in the room scenario.

    With regards to your staff, situational awareness is critical for a crisis team leader, but the human impact is often overlooked in that awareness. We must identify some ways to help you build employee engagement during a crisis.

    Building Employee Engagement during a Crisis

    There are 3 key steps to building employee engagement during a crisis. This involves:

    • Recognising when employees have specific needs in a crisis:
      • Are my colleagues safe?
      • What work will I be doing?
      • Will I still get paid?
      • How will this impact my family?
      • What support will you offer me?
    • Utilising Employee Assistance Programs:
      • Employee Assistance Programs (EAP) are typically provided by external professional organisations. They are contracted to provide confidential support and advice to employees for a range of mental health and well-being issues. Unfortunately, most employees are not familiar with EAP programs or how they operate.  In addition, many employees distrust that any contact will remain confidential. Access to EAP programs should be available for any mental health and well-being issue, not just trauma situations.
    • Debriefing:
      • A debriefing is a one-time, semi-structured conversation with an individual who has just experienced a stressful or traumatic event. Consideration should be given on:
        • When do you debrief?
        • Who should receive a debrief?
        • Who should conduct a debrief?

     

    Key Success Factors for Engaging Employees

    Successfully engaging employees during a crisis requires Crisis Managers to provide the right mix of:

    • Information
    • Communication
    • Intervention
    • Follow-up

    Don’t forget the human factor in your plans. Your staff are your most important assets to facilitating a successful recovery from whatever unexpected event has come your way. Staff will more than likely react differently to different types of crisis events. Make sure you are prepared and ready for that.

    Writing a strategy into a plan and not confirming its validity through desktop or live scenarios, is not a strategy at all. Validate the plan, validate the strategy and validate your staff.

  • Why is the value of social media in a crisis still being ignored?

    Why is the value of social media in a crisis still being ignored?

    It astounds me that so many businesses still don’t grasp the importance of using social media as a critical communication tool to both listen and talk to their stakeholders in a crisis situation.

    Either they still don’t understand social media (umm…..it has been around for more than a decade), or they are simply too scared to use it (possibly fearing a pile on).

    The simple fact is, the community will pummel you on social media regardless of your lack of engagement. And then a second time because of it.

    I also question why businesses do the right thing by providing a media interview or statement, but then fail to post it on their own website. Why wouldn’t you publish your message where everyone can read it, in full and unfiltered, rather than relying on the media to tell your story?

    During this year’s ski season, a chair fell off the Gunbarrel Express chairlift at Thredbo Ski Resort. Luckily the single passenger on board suffered minor bruising only. Which was extremely lucky.

    Thredbo put out a media statement to say it was caused by “a freak gust of wind”. They did the right thing by posting the statement on their Facebook page, but then totally ignored the 470+ comments that followed, and the hundreds more on Twitter and other online ski forums.

    Many of these comments seriously questioned the safety of Thredbo’s lifts, including a very nervous passenger who witnessed the incident from the discomfort of the following chair:

    This post had a very sensible suggestion. It should have been one of Thredbo’s key messages:

    Not engaging on social media in a crisis is a serious blind spot.

    If a communications advisor doesn’t include social media as an integral listening and response channel in a crisis communications response, you need to find someone else for the job.

    Although in defence of communications professionals, sometimes executives or members of a crisis management team think they are more qualified in communications and overrule recommendations to engage.

    In that case, they get what they deserve.

    One of my favourite mantras in crisis communications is: “In the absence of information, people automatically assume the worst”

    It is basic human psychology, the power of which should never be underestimated in a crisis.

  • A well-established La Niña is heading our way

    A well-established La Niña is heading our way

    A break from serious bushfires in Australia comes in the form of a good dumping of rain. Just when we thought we may get a break from this terrible natural event, we get news of another in the form of too much rain.

    With La Niña well and truly set in for the 2020-2021 summer, the threat landscape is looking challenging once again when considering our natural disaster risk.

    The facts on La Niña so far

    December to February rainfall is likely to be above average across most of Australia, except west coast Tasmania. The average daytime temperatures during December to February are likely to be above the long-term average across parts of southeast and far west Australia, as well as along the northern coastline.

    Furthermore, the average night-time temperatures during December to February are very likely to be above the long-term average across almost all of Australia.

    La Niña is underway in the tropical Pacific which typically increases the likelihood of above average rainfall across eastern Australia during summer.

    In this blog, we’ll break down a few immediate considerations and statistics you need to know to understand whether La Niña is a risk to your business and people.

     

    Increased flood potential

    Where 2019 presented a fire disruption like never before, La Niña will provide the heightened risk of flooding. Many organisations will need to reassess their location and combined risks, but it’s important to consider that flooding alone may not be the biggest threat with this natural disaster.

    Your staff working from home brings with it many complications. If you’re implementing a work-from-home (WFH) strategy, consider that some of your people may already be living in flood zones. If you’ve implemented WFH off the back of government requirements, you’re unlikely to have a secondary  place of work. This could mean key staff are now unavailable.

    If your staff are able to come into the office, flooding can delay or permanently impact travel routes or business trips. What does this look like for you?

    Supply chain and third party suppliers that rely on travel could once again be hindered by weather related events. We’re quite aware of this from previous seasons, but it seldom occurs during an existing crisis of this scale. Could your suppliers handle two disruptions of this size? Have they proven to you they have validated their response here?

    Increased potential for utility and communications outages

    Workplaces, worksites, working from home, clients in the community (supported persons or independent living) can all be disrupted by events like flooding. Procedures need to be established to ensure there are backup plans for communication outages.

    For example, the extreme heat, flooding and fire risk Australia is continuously presented with often takes out key requirements like your internet and phone line.

    The Australian Energy Market Operator has warned of a heightened risk of power outages as an offset of COVID-19, specifically in Victoria during high demand summer days. Organisations need to consider how power outages could impact them when looking at COVID work arounds.

    Can your key people still communicate if that happens – especially from a work from home set up.

    Each region is different, verify yours

    It’s important to understand the risks specific to your region and your supply chain, then verify your response strategies unique to it.

    Consider:

    1. Potential weather-related risks for your locations.
    2. Review and confirm the relocation / redundancy strategies in your business continuity plan (BCP). Consider if there is potential for your primary and redundancy locations to be affected by the same event as we mentioned above?
    3. Review and confirm the recovery strategy for loss of ICT in your BCP. Consider: how will your team communicate in the event of a loss of key systems?
    4. Review and confirm strategies for unavailability of staff (e.g. who cannot travel due to flooding)

    How to prepare right now

    In order to be ready for whatever is thrown at us over summer this year, you need to discuss some key points with your team.

    1. What arrangements will you need to put in place to be ready for potential weather hazards?

    Look at your work from home strategy and consider what outages you can and cannot afford. What key people need to be reachable at all times? How does the pandemic affect how you can react to a significant natural disaster. Remember, things are different now, so your plans are also likely out of date.

    1. Confirm the process to be followed in the event of a denial of access or building outage (actual or potential) including notification and relocation.

    Often, denial of access is sudden and requires immediate action at very short notice. COVID-19 has allowed us to practice and engage different working structures and collaboration to what we’re used to. What worked well in this experience and what can be reiterated during La Niña?

    1. Confirm the process to be followed in the event of a loss of IT or communications system (including for dispersed workforce).

    Does all your team have the ability for IT to access their laptops or workstations? How clear is this to the wider team? Make sure this is communicated with your suppliers too.

    In summary

    However this weather event affects you, it’s important you give it as much respect and attention as COVID-19 is getting. Afterall, there is no doubt that both events will coincide with each other soon enough.

  • When life imitates a crisis exercise

    When life imitates a crisis exercise

    What would you do if you could predict the future?

    Some people say they would go to the racetrack and make their fortune. Others with a more altruistic bent say they would use their super power to avert tragedy or mayhem.

    We don’t have a crystal ball at RiskLogic, but because we run over 200 crisis and business continuity exercises a year, we do spend a lot of time looking into the future and have become very accurate at anticipating disaster (see examples below).

    Four times a week we stress test an executive team somewhere in Australia, New Zealand or around the world.

    To come up with the exercise scenarios, we collaborate closely with our clients to review their risk register, look at trends in their industry and analyse domestic and international events.

    Our primary objective is to make the exercises as realistic as possible. We develop scenarios where the likelihood and the consequences combine to keep their CEOs and Boards awake at night.

    Given the amount of risk data that we’re privileged to have access to, it is not a total surprise that these hypothetical scenarios often eventuate in real life, sometimes just days or weeks after we have run the exercise.

    It is a constant reminder that crisis events and major business disruptions are “a question of when, not if”.

    Here are a few examples of exercises we have run recently that have quickly turned to reality.

    Client: Horticulture producer, Vic
    Exercise scenario: multiple bushfires on a Code Red day that threatened their large-scale orchard and production facility.
    Reality: two weeks later a bushfire started just a couple of kilometres from the scenario ignition site, on the region’s second ever Code Red day.

    Client: Major Australian port operator
    Exercise scenario: a large container ship running into a dock in strong winds, causing a large container crane to collapse.
    Reality: just four days later in Antwerp, a large container ship broke it’s mooring in strong winds, striking a crane and causing it to collapse. The dramatic footage can be found here.

    Client: A major shopping centre
    Exercise scenario: a CBD lockdown as active shooters took lives and hostages in a terrorist attack in the heart of Sydney.
    Reality: two months later, parts of the Sydney CBD were locked down as a man went on a knife rampage, stabbing a woman and terrorising city workers.

    Client: Unnamed
    Exercise scenario: a senior staff member arrested and charged on fraud charges, causing major reputational damage.
    Reality: six months later, a senior staff member was arrested and charged, creating significant logistical and HR challenges and adverse media coverage.

    It goes without saying that our clients were extremely well prepared to handle these highly volatile issues.

    They were smart. They set aside just three hours in their year to test drive a crisis and build their capability and confidence before they faced the real thing.

    Investing in organisational resilience is good for your business and your people. So to avoid being caught out, get on the front foot and book in a crisis or business continuity exercise for 2020.

  • Crisis Management in Tourism – When Tragedy Strikes

    Crisis Management in Tourism – When Tragedy Strikes

    The tourism industry has experienced exponential increase in global travel in recent decades, but with this comes new challenges. Organisations conducting travel, such as travel companies, schools or universities, are facing growing pressures to efficiently manage natural disasters or man-made catastrophes around the globe.

    Last year was no exception, with several events creating enormous challenges in crisis management for the industry, their staff, the local population and the travelling public.

    Human intervention caused traveller chaos in many popular destinations including:

    • Civil unrest in Paris
    • Protest activity in Hong Kong
    • The Christchurch mosque shootings
    • Easter Sunday bombings in Sri Lanka
    • London Bridge stabbing attack

    Meanwhile mother nature didn’t make it any easier:

    • The ongoing eruptions of Mt Agung on Bali and Mt Sinabung on Sumatra
    • The Mt White eruption in New Zealand
    • One of the deadliest climbing seasons on Mt Everest
    • The typhoon in Japan that cancelled Rugby World Cup matches
    • Hurricane Barry on the Gulf Coast of USA
    • Hurricane Dorian in The Bahamas

    And of course, domestically Australia faced the worst bushfire season on record.

    These events in popular destinations are a sobering reminder of how a happy holiday, or group tour, can quickly and unexpectedly turn into a tragic nightmare.

    Hope for the best, plan for the worst

    With every incident that occurs, the question is raised as to how this will impact the travel industry.

    “Such events can turn people away from a particular area. They also place greater crisis response expectations on travel companies, tour operators, or even school and university groups,” says Briony Morgan, Senior Manager of RiskLogic’s Resilience Services. “It’s imperative that organisations are properly prepared for a worst-case scenario.”

    As well as completing a risk assessment, companies need to invest time, money and resources into developing a comprehensive crisis management plan. At a minimum, the plan should include:

    • Assessment and decision-making tools
    • Communications plan including stakeholder map, key messages for various scenarios, roles and responsibilities, agreed approval processes and checklists to ensure all channels and tactics are considered.
    • Resources available
    • Escalation and notification processes.

    “A crisis management plan that sits on a shelf gathering dust is next to useless,” says Jessica Petersen – Manager, Resilience Services at RiskLogic. “The crisis management plan has to be practical. Staff must be trained and rehearsed using scenario exercises so that everyone in the organisation is confident and capable of executing the plan if an incident strikes. A generic plan won’t suit every organisation as it needs to be tailored. It must clearly define duty of care as well as identify responsibilities from on-the-ground tour leaders right through to the strategic and executive teams making decisions on behalf of the organisation.”

    Communication is a critical component

    Not receiving accurate and timely information in a crisis creates anxiety and frustration for those involved in the disaster and their loved ones who are desperate for news.

    Although social media has the potential to spread news quickly, there can be limitations around accuracy, including the potential for uncorrected misinformation to morph into myths that are believed to be fact.

    Emergency services and government authorities such as Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) may also have limitations as to what information they can or can’t confirm in a crisis, particularly if the next of kin have not yet been informed.

    “In the absence of information, people always assume the worst,” confirms Briony Morgan . “A slow or poor communications response has the potential to exacerbate the negative impact to stakeholders. Media and armchair experts can start criticising the company for mismanaging the situation, adding fuel to the fire.”

    “Tour and travel companies need a comprehensive Crisis Communications Plan to ensure they can reach all their stakeholders quickly and accurately.”

    A ‘hub and spoke’ model of communication is very effective in a crisis, where you place all your public information in the hub. Your website is often the best hub, but Twitter can also be used as your ‘single source of truth’ to communicate a rapidly changing issue. You then use your spokes, which are all your available communication channels (owned, earned and paid), to deliver your message to the wide circle of stakeholders around you.

    Global travel will continue to rise

    People have been roaming the planet for centuries whether on pilgrimages, to experience different cultures or see new sights. Despite the increasing risks from a number of natural and man-made events, many people will continue to seek adventure and new experiences. To help protect people when disaster does strike, travel companies must be prepared with a robust crisis management plan, the latest tools and a well-rehearsed team that can effectively manage any critical incident.