The “Occupy” protests have created some difficult situations for business owners and their employees, staff and customers. The unusual organization, coupled with the displacement of public areas by large numbers of demonstrators represents a possible disruption to your business, regardless of politics. Therefore, you need to take the potential for business disruption seriously. These five points provide a solid foundation for a company response and recovery to such a situation.
1. Establish Communication
It is critically important to establish and maintain a clear line of communication with civil authorities. I'm not talking about 911. It should be a sustained communication before, during and after an emergency. It starts with something as simple as contacting the police department through the non-emergency number and identifying yourself as a business owner with an establishment near the protest scene. Not only does it provide a face to an institution, it allows both of you to relay information on safety and updates as a potentially unstable situation evolves.
Hopefully, your business continuity and emergency manager has incorporated this into your disaster program, as these relationships are much easier to establish before an emergency arises.
2. Protect Employees and Customers
Depending on where your business is located in relation to the protest, your business may be subject to an increased risk of property or violent crime. While the “Occupy” protests have been predominantly non-violent, every civil disruption has the potential to attract individuals not associated with the protest who are solely interested in creating mayhem and criminal mischief. This has been the case with organized protests at the G-8 meetings, or with Free Trade protests at WTO gatherings. Take extra time to ensure you are protecting your employees and customers. Consider your parking lot, ingress/egress, customer interactions, utilities, etc. Make sure your emergency manager assigned to your business has done a complete threat assessment so as to expose your vulnerabilities and provide tailored strategies.
3. Don’t clutter the street
If you have a brick-and-mortar facility with signs, merchandise or objects outside, consider keeping them inside for the duration of the demonstration. Property that is placed outside during any kind of disruption is subject to vandalism or destruction. Worse, these objects could be used as weapons against law enforcement or civil authority if a confrontation occurs.
During celebrations after a college football game in Colorado in the early 1990s, inebriated fans threw bottles and glasses at law enforcement, causing injuries to both sides. The next day, after law and order had been restored, that broken glass caused injuries to students and staff who were simply trying to cross the street to campus.
In response, the city passed an ordinance and required bars to pass out only plastic cups and could not serve bottled beer the day of any game at the stadium. As a result, the next year, the violence was minimal, and there were few injuries.
4. Prepare to Shelter-in-Place
If the situation becomes violent or results in a confrontation with law enforcement, you and your staff need to be prepared to shelter-in-place. One of the most dramatic and visible responses is the deployment of RCAs (Riot-Control Agents), which is a chemical counter-measure intended to deescalate a violent situation. At this point, you, your customers and staff are all at risk. So make sure your shelter-in-place plan is updated by your emergency manager, and your staff trained.
5. Execute a Quick Recovery
If the demonstrations threaten to interrupt your company, get your business continuity plan out and prepare your staff and infrastructure. Don’t let the situation take over your day-to-day operations! Your continuity plan will have all the contingencies necessary to keep your operations continuous.
You can’t control what goes on out there, but you can control what your company does about it! If there is a disruption, begin execution of the plan within a few hours. This is the critical timeframe that will determine how your company does long-term.
Conclusion
For our clients, we work very hard on recovery from these types of foreseeable events, because a company can be severely affected if it doesn’t take some basic steps to prepare. So make sure you have a continuity plan written by a professional. It will make all the difference when you Reverse Disaster.
phardy
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