Day 1: From Governance to Disciplined Crisis Decisions

Building Crisis Governance

• The crisis governance structure
• Clarify crisis decision authority
• Set team activation criteria
• Establish controls for crisis closure

Assigning Crisis Roles

• Required crisis team roles
• Assign responsibilities to named functions
• Alternates for critical roles
• Clarify escalation responsibilities during crises

Classifying Crisis Levels

• Criteria for crisis levels
• Link severity to response actions
• Set escalation thresholds for incidents
• Align classifications across response teams

Day 2: Reading Signals Before Events Escalate

Defining Critical Scenarios

• Credible high impact scenarios
• Describe operational effects of scenarios
• Prioritize scenarios requiring detailed plans
• Connect scenarios to continuity priorities

Building Early Warning Indicators

• Select indicators linked to threats
• Warning thresholds for escalation
• Assign owners for monitoring indicators
• Test how warnings trigger action

Conducting Business Impact Analysis

• Processes critical to operations
• Impact of prolonged disruption
• Define maximum tolerable downtime
• Determine minimum recovery requirements

Day 3: Turning Business Impact into Continuity Priority

Identifying Critical Services

• List services that cannot stop
• Rank services by business impact
• Minimum acceptable service levels
• Assign ownership for service recovery

Mapping Business Dependencies

• Map dependencies between critical activities
• Supporting people and technology
• Facility and supplier reliance
• Highlight single points of failure

Designing Continuity Strategies

• Select continuity options by scenario
• Compare feasibility cost and resilience
• Manual workarounds where needed
• Document triggers for activating strategies

Day 4: Leading Response Through Unified Command

Operating Crisis Command Centers

• Command center operating procedures
• Clarify information flows during crises
• Establish decision and reporting rhythms
• Maintain a shared operating picture

Coordinating Emergency Response

• Define emergency response priorities
• Coordinate actions across response teams
• Responder safety and resources
• Escalate issues requiring executive support

Managing Crisis Communications

• Identify crisis communication audiences
• Prepare accurate holding messages
• Coordinate internal and external communications
• Control approval of sensitive messages

Day 5: Testing Readiness Before Real Crisis

Designing Simulation Exercises

• Define realistic exercise objectives
• Build scenarios around priority risks
• Inject events to test decisions
• Set criteria for exercise evaluation

Conducting After-Action Reviews

• Collect evidence from exercise performance
• Strengths and response gaps
• Agree corrective actions and owners
• Closure of improvement actions

Maintaining Continuity Plans

• Update plans after exercises
• Reflect changes in business operations
• Validate contact and dependency information
• Schedule regular continuity plan reviews

• Workplace case analysis focused on Building Crisis Governance
• Guided workshop developing a working tool around Classifying Crisis Levels
• Facilitated team exercise applying Mapping Business Dependencies to a realistic case
• Applied scenario exercise centered on Maintaining Continuity Plans