Attainium Insights, short, practical observations and examples drawn from real-world tabletop exercises and business continuity planning.
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Today we have a multitude of options for mass communications, but often we don't have a clue about how to decide on one that's best for our individual needs. This issue looks at the types of capabilities you need in a system, how you can use these systems to solve other corporate problems, the importance of testing and maintaining such systems, and on what criteria to evaluate potential vendors.
The hurricane season begins June 1 and brings with it many severe weather threats that can cause problems through November. Early predictions indicate 14 named storms, seven of which will be hurricanes and three of which will be major hurricanes. This is better than last year but still slightly above average. These articles cover a range of topics, including communication in a hurricane and legal issues of concern. What are you doing now to prepare your business to deal with the potential disasters that could threaten?
Business Continuity Awareness Week is May 14-18. The theme this year is "Working together to improve organizational resilience." It's a good time to take steps to ensure that your business will be able to recover from an emergency or crisis. The first thing you have to do is stop thinking that it won't happen here because, eventually, it will, and you need to be prepared. Everyone in the organization needs to be aware of any plans and to know what their roles are. These articles can help in your preparations.
The laws and regulations of business continuity planning are pretty well known at this point, but ethical and cultural considerations may not be. These ethical and cultural issues are not illegal, but, as some have called some such practices, are "lawful but awful." You need to consider all these issues in your planning to prevent problems and even liabilities.
What do you think would happen if a Broadway play had no rehearsals? The actors all know their lines, but now the curtain is going up and nobody knows where to stand, where to exit, or where the props are. So they each know their parts but they have no idea how they work together. That play would probably close right after opening night. So what would happen if you had to use your business continuity plan(s) in a crisis without any kind of rehearsal? Would your people know what to do, where to go, who's in charge? We doubt it. Here are some tips on testing that will help your plan work when it's called on.
There's a data breach in your future, whether you believe it or not. As we find more ways to protect our data, hackers find better ways to steal it. The result of these breaches goes beyond the extensive financial cost. Your stock price may drop. Customer trust is eroded. Corporate reputation may be damaged. Recovering from all of these impacts is expensive and time-consuming. Your business continuity plan should include some planning for preventing and responding to these attacks.
If you are using social media as a tool, your organization can benefit (or suffer) in many ways. Using it ineffectively can cause problems that might negatively impact your bottom line. Using it well to gain new customers can have the opposite effect. Here are some of the effective ways to use this range of tools.
April 4, 2018 - We find ourselves in the post-truth era. What does this mean to those of us who need to gain the public's trust to achieve our missions and improve our bottom lines? And what does it mean to our marketing communications? Crisis Communications? The most clues to navigating and surviving this era come from understanding what post-truth means.
