I’m fond of the old military saying: “two is one and one is none.” It reminds me to have a backup for critical equipment, like ensuring my spare tire is filled and ready to go before embarking on a cross-country road trip.
It’s hard to run to an auto parts store if something goes wrong when I’m driving across Death Valley sans cell reception, for instance. And having an extra Goodyear in the trunk is both insurance and peace of mind because I know I won’t be stranded with a flat in the desert. But why is this important for business? Why are having backups and redundancy essential, and how do these make you react and work faster in a crisis?
The first thing to do is to avoid key person risk, where only one person can conduct some critical activity for your business. Usually, that’s a key decision maker, but it could also be the person who has signing authority for financial payments or the person who can authorize a press release. If only one person can fulfill a critical function in your business and they’re not available, then your entire response and recovery process will grind to a halt. This is why we recommend adding alternates to your organization’s chain of command who can step in and step up when needed.
Adding redundancy to your crisis team and plans ensures that your crisis response won’t be delayed if a critical system goes down. Can’t access the video meeting platform? Jump onto an old-fashioned audio conference call. Is your office inaccessible and you can’t use a regular meeting room? Message the core crisis team to muster at a different meeting space or virtually. Your online systems are down due to a cyberattack? Have paper copies of crisis response plans and contact information available as back up.
Adding redundancy also allows you to handle a surge in activity that may come from a crisis. Additional capacity – whether that’s extra people or backup systems – will remain unused until there’s a surge in demand, and that’s a good thing. Having a few additional team members who are cross-trained in social media monitoring or having the second-in-command to your CEO undergo media training gives you options when the stakes are highest. These can be outside consultants – a crisis management team, additional legal representation, a PR agency, or outsourced IT help desk technicians — who can step in at short notice. Sometimes it’s as simple as setting up an additional direct phone line specifically for media inquiries.
By taking time to add spare resources into your crisis plans NOW, you’ll be better positioned to cope with managing all aspects of your crisis response swiftly without delays that can occur when backup capacity doesn’t exist. Not only will taking these steps help you generate speed today, they will also help future proof your system because you’re better able to manage what might come at you tomorrow.
Kith facilitates crisis preparedness workshops that will help your company attain the clarity, trust, and speed you need to respond confidently – no dithering! – to any crisis. We’d be happy to have a conversation about how we can help your company be ready to chart an effective course to reputation protection.
