Crisis Management Program Management

Continuous Improvement

A crisis management system must have integrity and currency to achieve a state of crisis preparedness and the strategic response capacity to manage and recover from crises.

Techniques to build integrity and currency into the crisis plan will be thoroughly explained.

Hierarchy of Crisis Preparedness within Organisation

The Level of Crisis Preparedness table below, adapted from Mitroff and Pearson (1993), can describe the organisation's CM maturity.

Stage	Crisis Preparedness Level	Description of CM Preparedness Level The organisation
1	Prone to crisis	There is virtually no early warning system in place for detecting major crises. Believe that crises rarely occur. Rarely plan for damage containment before the crisis hits, and recovery systems are not established. Do not learn from their past mistakes because they do not conduct formal review sessions.
2	Susceptible to crisis	Represents a decisive advance beyond stage one. Although better prepared, they are still very vulnerable to various crises. They have a comprehensive program for natural and human-directed disasters of all kinds, but they are unlikely to plan or prepare for other crisis families. Plan for neither external economic attacks nor external information attacks.
3	Adjusted to Crisis	Have in-depth plans and procedures for a limited number of breakdowns, such as computer malfunction, serious operator errors or major security breaches. They justify their actions with rationalizations such as “our size will protect us from a major crisis,” “excellent, well-managed companies do not have crises,” and “crisis management is a luxury which we cannot afford.” Do not appreciate the complex relationships that will contribute to a crisis.
4	Braced for Crisis	They do not represent a definite improvement from the "Adjusted to Crisis" category concerning the types of crises identified and the preventive actions. The refinements are found in the management of the crises' phases. There is a CM effort that may be formalized for the earlier and later phases of the crisis. Thus, in addition to planning for crisis containment, some planning may take place for crisis prevention and detection. As such, the effort is directed towards the proactive mode of CM. Has created a CM team responsible for facilitating and formalizing CM efforts.
5	Prepared for Crisis	Has developed plans and procedures that explicitly consider all the critical systems that prevent major crises. Does not see the causes of crises as purely technical. Is sensitive to human, organizational and staff feedback as well. As a result, they are much more likely to have explicit programs that simultaneously address human factor issues. Has a greater awareness of the underlying organizational culture and how it contributes positively and negatively to CM.

Mitroff and Pearson (1993) argue that CM is not equivalent to planning for a crisis scenario because the latter may be ineffective as it fails to address four major areas of concern. An integrated approach must explicitly and systematically attend to the potential overlaps and interactions of the four major variables of crisis management:

Types
Phases
Systems
Stakeholders

It is suggested that by analysing the organizational performance in each of the four major variables, one could establish a hierarchy of five stages of crisis preparedness: crisis-prone, crisis-susceptible, crisis-adjusted, crisis and crisis preparedness.

Goh, M. H. (2016). A Manager’s Guide to Implement Your Crisis Management Plan. Business Continuity Management Specialist Series (1st ed., p. 192). Singapore: GMH Pte Ltd.

Extracted from CM Training and Awareness

More Information About Crisis Management Blended/ Hybrid Learning Courses

To learn more about the course and schedule, click the buttons below for the CM-300 Crisis Management Implementer [CM-3] and the CM-5000 Crisis Management Expert Implementer [CM-5].