Emergency Management

Emergency Management

In today’s environment, an emergency management plan and program are mandatory. They address associated risks and compliance requirements and are a key aspect of good corporate security governance.

Defining effective emergency capabilities aids organisations to prevent, prepare for, respond to, and recover from serious emergency-related incidents.

Good emergency management plans and supporting elements assist those tasked with responding to know their roles and responsibilities and, the expectations of them in an emergency.

These days, emergency management focusses on responding to many more events than traditional hazards may cause in a workplace, such as building fires. Emergency plans must address the potential for terrorism, including national guidelines (run/hide/tell) for responding to such an event.

Practitioners must also validate and assure dependencies, such as the assumed role of an external building/precinct manager in an emergency, versus those in different areas/floors/leased areas of a building/site.

Emergency Management Considerations

Basic plans and emergency arrangements must meet the requirements of AS 3745-2010 Planning for emergencies in facilities, which articulates the committees, appointments, protocols and general arrangements for base-level emergency planning.

Industry Risk has crafted a significant number of emergency plans, which were designed to meet the needs of both smaller and larger organisations, and to address a range of contexts that demanded detailed planning and consideration.

Key to each of these plans was a need to gauge specific requirements around:

• The organisation and its specific needs.
• Obligatory planning committees and forums.
• Site/building management integration and addressing unrealistic expectations.
• Plan development, including through assessment of assessed risks.
• Lockdown, including infrastructure and accommodating multiple recourses.
• Evacuation (of both buildings and large-scale sites).
• Emergency communications between internal stakeholders and Emergency Services.
• Integration with other plans, especially business continuity and crisis management.
• Training and awareness.

Stakeholder Collaboration

The first step we take in designing your plan, or indeed improving an existing one, is to appreciate what it is you are seeking to achieve. We don’t arrive with preconceived notions of what you should do, but we do come armed with the knowledge and experience to show you what may work best in your situation.

We also like to understand the drivers behind the change you are seeking, so that we can suggest further considerations that may improve your visualised outcome, and usually for the same amount of effort, or indeed less.

At all stages thereafter we ensure that the appropriate level of consultation is performed with relevant individuals and groups, to maximise the likelihood of acceptance, take up and ultimately, success.

Emergency Management Plan Structure

Each emergency plan that we develop is unique, as it should be. We don’t take the approach of servicing the mass market through boilerplate templates, nor do we seek to recreate the discipline through overly complex documentation.

Our plans are tailored to the address the Preparation and Respond stages of the Australian Comprehensive Model, and to provide the basis for moving, in an integrated way, to the Recover stage.

We have developed brief emergency management plans, those that incorporate the transition to business continuity phases, and others that have served to evacuate complex sites, including the entire population of a key Defence installation to a nearby assembly area.

Our focus on the scope and client needs/nuances means that each is fit for its intended purpose, and compliant with the relevant standards and legislation.

Industries

We have served most sectors over our many years in assisting organisations plan for emergencies, including:

If you require emergency management assistance, contact Industry Risk today to see how Australia’s leading light in security and emergency management planning can help your organisation to refine its resilience arrangements and maximise the safety of your personnel.