Image courtesy of artbird309.
The theme of the Boy Scouts is “Be Prepared”….
With that in mind, and in light of a recent barrage of natural disasters and freak accidents (Minnesota Bridge Collapse, Utah miners being trapped, tropical storms, earthquakes, fires)…
How can individuals and organizations (businesses, government, religious) be prepared to manage these situations?
August 15, 2007 at 15:47
There are two aspects to preparedness. Physical and mental.
I had an experience when I was in boy scouts that taught me a good lesson about preparedness. I had agreed with someone else on a campout that they would bring the tent, and i would bring other supplies. He wasn’t at the meeting spot, but had called and said he would join us at the camp later in the day. The day draws to an end with no friend and no tent. The other tents are completely full, so I try to build a tarp shelter. That night was a very rainy and stormy night, and I woke up soaked (I was in a down bag, so I was warm). It was a pretty miserable night. I learned to not depend on others for preparedness.
So, both individuals and organizations need to be prepared. They can do this by taking the physical preparations (stockpiles of food, clothing, supplies, etc), but of equal importance in the mental preparation. The know how of what to do, where to go, etc. Being assertive and calm in a stressful environment. These leadership qualities are things that are necessary in an emergency situation. Without them, a physically prepared group can be overcome with anxiety and panic and not correctly handle the situation.
Those are some principles. Implementation is left as an exercise for the reader.
August 15, 2007 at 20:19
Planning is a big part of my life and professional career. Disaster and contigency planning is not an easy task to tackle. In my profession, I need to rely on risk management activities to help identify potential risks to mitigate and address. The point of using risk management is to focus on the most likely and riskiest issues. This can help provide some focus. It is impossible to develop contingencies for everything.
The other part of my profession that is critical is training and preparedness. The skills necessary to complete a task / activity / job should be defined as completely as possible. If the people in the organization are not qualified, then either find qualified people or provide training and skill development.
The only real way to demonstrate that people are prepared and trained is to gain experience. This can be done through simulations and mock situations, as well as on the job. In the business world and in real-life, the efforts of the team as usually as good as the weakest link. Leadership has to be strong in these situations too.