10 Essential Steps to Disaster Recovery

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10 Essential Steps to Disaster Recovery
Colorado Municipal League 2009 Annual
Conference Vail, Colorado

• Planning to Stay in Business!

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Why Is Disaster Planning Important?

• Should be a part of every organizations
  operations plan
• Protects public assets and people
• Proactive vs. Reactive
• Good business sense
• Helps assure business and operational
  continuation
• ABSOLUTLY ESSENTIAL FOR ORGANIZAITONAL SURVIVAL!

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How will you deliver your municipal services
after this?
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Greensburg, KS May 4, 2007
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The Cost of Disasters Emergencies

• Deaths and injuries to citizens and staff
• Property and infrastructure losses
• Business continuity damaged
• Operational capacity reduced
• Negative impacts on budgets and reserves
• Image and reputation reduced
• Loss of trust and confidence

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Oklahoma City April 19, 1995
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Getting Started - Face Reality

• It cant happen to us
• Well, it can!
• Accept that possibility

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Disaster Management Cycle
PREPAREDNESS
MITIGATION
RESPONSE
RECOVERY
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The First Minutes Of Response Are Critical

• You need to make great decisions!
• The actions you take in the first 60 minutes will
  determine how well you succeed in your disaster
  recovery efforts
• Chaos reigns
• Shock, Confusion, Danger
• Little or no information on the situation
• People may need of rescue medical help
• How can you make great decisions in this
  environment?
• Have a PLAN!

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The Value of a Plan

• It takes planning to get to recovery
• Plans build control and stability
• They create decision perimeters
• Provide action templates and checklists
• Support process and critical management elements
  into decision-making during a crisis
• They minimize
• Failures by inaction
• Group-think
• Analysis-Paralysis
• Guessing and Freelancing
• Reliance on luck
• Poor communication Surprises

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Grand Forks, NDFlood of the Century Spring 1997
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Business Continuity

• A simple concept
• Its assuring the continuation of your
  organization following a disaster
• Knowing what to do in order to protect and
  recover your business functions and assets
• What to do How to do it When to do it
• Where to do it Who will do it
• Without continuity planning you only have a 50-50
  chance of surviving a disaster
• Are those odds good enough for you???

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Step One Start Your Emergency Management
Planning Process

• NOW! Planning is the foundation to a successful
  disaster or emergency incident recovery
• Task a group to develop the EMP
• The Planning Team
• Someone must be responsible and accountable for
  the plan
• The size of the planning team depends on your
  needs and expectations
• The PT should have members from all
  areas/functions/stakeholders of the organization
  to encourage participation and buy-in to the
  plan.
• A larger group increases the amount of time and
  energy participants are able to invest in the
  planning process
• It also enhances the visibility and stature of
  the planning process
• It provides for a broad perspective on the issues
  
• Have participants appointed in writing by upper
  management and their job descriptions could also
  reflect this assignment

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Step One - Emergency Management Plan

• Issue a Mission Statement developed by the
  Planning Group and supported by management
• The mission statement should
• Define the purpose of the plan and day that it
  will involve the entire organization
• Define the authority and structure of the
  Planning Group
• Establish a work schedule and planning deadlines.
  Timelines can be modified as priorities become
  more clearly defined.
• Establish a Schedule and Budget
• Develop an initial budget that will support the
  planning process and sufficient to complete the
  EMP.

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Dont Build a Big Book

• The old Books are ineffective plans
• Civil Defense Era Model (limited scope)
• Todays recovery challenges are dynamic
• Sofocus on
• Activating your recovery plan
• Keeping your entity operational
• Survival
• Reduce actions to checklists
• Youll never regret this effort

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Southern California Mudslides December 2003
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Step Two - Identify Rank Your Key
Business/Operational Functions

• What elements are essential to keep you
  operating?
• Rank these critical areas for the most attention
  in your planning process
• If you have five and can only afford to address
  two now, pick the top two
• Protect and prepare to recover what is most
  important to keeping your doors open

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Step Three - Avoid the Black Box Trap

• Many organizations ready have a plan
• But most have little idea how it was generated
• Often, the plan itself is sometimes too
  complicated to understand
• During a disaster response, you wont have time
  to read a book!
• For a plan to work you and your people must
  understand it
• Know how it is created Focus on the goal
• Good plans follow a logical process
• Keep it SIMPLE

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Step Four Stage Your Response

• In a disaster, some things must be done
  immediately and some can wait
• Identify the levels of your response and document
  them in the EMP
• When disaster strikes you want
• The right people and decisions
• Assets and support immediately
• Resources necessary to maintain operations
• Remember, recovery starts with the response!

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Resource Priority Levels

• CRITICAL
• Needed immediately!
• VITAL
• Within the next 8-12 hours
• NECESSARY
• Within 24 hours
• DESIRED
• Within 48-72 hours
• Do this in your plan

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Step Five Recognize Your Threats

• Natural Disasters
• Floods Blizzards Landslides Tornados Fires
• Technological and Human Disasters
• Train Wrecks Haz-Mat Incidents Aircraft
  Crashes Gas Line Explosions Power Failures
• Cyber-Attack Computer Virus Sabotage
• Human Error Worker Strikes
• Biological Disasters
• Flu Outbreak Pandemics
• Terrorist Attacks or Threat Events
• Bombings Biological Releases Hostage Situations

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Step Six Prioritize Your Threats

• Put your threats in order
• What will hurt you most?
• What are the odds it will happen?
• Focus on those that will hurt the most

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Step Seven Adopt the Three Cs

• Communication The Fatal Flaw
• Without communication nothing happens
• You cant over communicate
• Plan for communication back-ups
• Practice matrix communication
• Cooperation
• Internally and Externally
• Coordination
• If it doesnt work well today, it will work worse
  during an emergency
• Encourage inter-departmental coordination and
  communication

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Step Eight Train Your People

• Train people in what you want done
• Reduce actions to checklists
• Critical assets and operations
• Techniques to mitigate and recover
• Teach them a management system
• Incident Command System (ICS) a great tool
• Required by FEMA
• NIMS NRP
• Train them on the tools of recovery
• Training helps eliminate freelancing

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Oakland Firestorm October 19, 1999
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The Incident Command System (ICS) Functional Areas
Command
Finance and Administration
Logistics
Planning
Operations
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Step Nine Test Your Plan

• Find out if the plan worksYou wont know until
  you test it
• Exercising the plan will
• Identify failures, shortfalls and problems
• Improve internal external communications
• Promote better working relationships
• Demonstrate preparedness to your customers
• Raise comfort levels
• Improve future communication
• Identify resource shortfalls
• Better to fail during a drill. . .

EM Plan
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Testing The Plan
Actual Event
Realism
Difficulty
Full Scale Exercise
Functional Exercise
Audits Seminars Plan Reviews Books, Tests
Tabletop Exercise
Drills Seminars
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Step Ten Dont Quit!

• Emergency Management Plans require continuous
  monitoring and updates
• A plan on the shelf more than a year without an
  update will fail in one or more areas
• Maintaining a plan is less expensive than
  building a new one!
• Budget and anticipate keeping your plan current

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Oklahoma City Lightening Storm
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Are We Current?

• A current plan requires
• Past problems have been identified and solved
• Todays threats have been added
• Periodic reviews are conducted
• Plan assumptions have been tested
• Some plan is better than none
• Current Success!

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Business Recovery Summary

• We are far from bulletproof
• Not a question of if, but when a disaster
  will strike us
• EMP is the critical foundation to help assure
  that your organization will survive a disaster
• You will need
• Managements commitment to the EMP process
• Staff and financial resources to plan
• Commitment to keeping the plan current
• Working relationships with others
• Commitment to the Three Cs
• We have work to do!

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Aden Hogan, Jr. City Manager, City of
Evans ahogan_at_ci.evans.co.us
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Resources

• EM Guide for Business Industry
• www.fema.gov/business/guide/index.shtm
• State Office of Emergency Preparedness
• Colorado Office of Emergency ManagementDivision
  of Local GovernmentDepartment of Local
  Affairs9195 East Mineral AvenueSuite
  200Centennial , Colorado 80112(720)
  852-6600(720) 852-6750 Faxwww.dola.state.co.us/o
  em/oemindex.htm
• FEMA Region VIII - Colorado
• Federal Emergency Management AgencyDenver
  Federal CenterBuilding 710, Box 25267Denver, CO
  80255-02674404
• www.fema.gov/pdf/areyouready/areyouready_full.pdf
• Public Risk Management Association
• www.prima.org
• Risk and Insurance Management Society
• www.rims.org

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Book Resources

• Infrastructure Security Planning in an Unstable
  World A Public Officials Guide to Security,
  (Paperback, AWWA)
• By Aden Hogan Jon DeBoer
• Emergency Planning Handbook, 2nd Edition
  (Paperback), By Antonin Ruki
• Risk Analysis and the Security Survey (Hardcover)
  By James Broder
• Comprehensive Emergency Management for Local
  Governments Demystifying Emergency Planning
  (Paperback)
• By James A. Gordon

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Book Resources

• Introduction to Emergency Management (Hardback,
  Butterworth-Heinemann) George Haddow Jane
  Bullock
• Living with Hazards, Dealing with Disasters An
  introduction to Emergency Management
• (Paperback) By William Waugh
• Disaster Management and Preparedness (Hardcover)
• Thomas Schneid Larry Collins