Tips for Creating a Plan that Addresses the 3 Key Phases of Business Continuity
On Feb. 7, 2011, at 7:45 p.m., smoke detectors were tripped at Pitney Bowes’ largest mail services presort facility in Grand Prairie, Texas, as a fire that started in another company’s nearby facility rapidly spread.
By 4:30 a.m., the fire had grown to a four-alarm blaze and raged through the night, damaging equipment worth millions of dollars. By 9 a.m., the entire facility — which served hundreds of commercial customers — was destroyed.
The unexpected can happen to any organization. And while you can’t control the unexpected, you can control the response.
In the case of the fire, the company’s response was drawn up months earlier. As a result, service continued without disruption. The morning after the incident, trucks started their routes, picking up mail from customers throughout the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Mail was presorted at a second Pitney Bowes facility in the vicinity and other sites in the region to ensure rapid induction and delivery.
Successful business continuity planning is a long-term corporate commitment. Planning takes much advanced work, assessing risk, identifying resources and generating detailed protocols. But as the incident at Pitney Bowes’ mail services center in the Dallas-Fort Worth area demonstrated, a fully trained staff, which is accustomed to making decisions, complying with a formal business continuity plan meant the difference between effective response and a complete breakdown in customer service.
SeeTips for Creating a Plan that Addresses the 3 Key Phases of Business Continuity, by Jay Oxton for Emergency Management.
Tags: disaster preparedness, Disaster Recovery, fire, Pitney Bowes
