Getting back to work after an interruption

The problem it solves

The first hours after a long interruption are spent on questions nobody left answered in writing: who decides when the owner cannot be reached, what gets restored first, what to tell the customer calling to ask whether their order still ships this week.

Almost no company lacks a plan. It has one, written at some point by someone no longer there, stored on the server that is precisely what will not come back on, drafted for an interruption other than the one that arrived. In practice the response is improvised, and it is improvised by tired people, with the phone ringing and half the facts missing, which is the worst possible moment to decide the order in which an operation comes back up.

What follows costs as much as the interruption itself. Attention goes to whatever shouts loudest rather than to what holds the business up. Decisions get made that later have to be undone. And the record of what was done by hand while the systems were down goes missing, an absence that resurfaces weeks later in the invoices, the inventory and the payroll, once nobody remembers the details.

What it covers

The workshop builds a plan that can be run with the company operating at half strength, which is the only condition in which a continuity plan ever gets used. It starts with the minimum operation: what has to keep running for the company to still be the company, and what is suspended without debate in the first days. That list is shorter than most teams expect, and agreeing it in calm conditions saves arguing about it in the middle of the event.

From there come the order of restoration and the authority to decide. The plan names who decides when the person who always decides is unreachable, up to what amount and what kind of commitment, because authority without limits is authority nobody delegates, which is why it never gets delegated. Access, contacts and documents that must be available without the office are prepared, and the most common and most fragile assumption gets tested: that everybody will still be able to get into the places they normally get into.

The messages are drafted in advance. In a writing exercise, participants put down what will be said to customers, staff and suppliers while information is still missing, which is exactly when something has to be said. Temporary manual work is covered as well: what gets recorded while the systems are down and how it is reconciled afterwards, because that piece is almost always discovered too late.

The session ends with a test. A short simulation runs against a scenario the group picks, staffed by the people who would realistically be available rather than the ideal roster, and whatever fails gets corrected in front of everyone. The plan also sets out what is reviewed once things are normal again, which is the moment something can be learned and the moment nobody wants to discuss it any more.

What participants learn

• Identify the minimum operation the company must hold during an interruption and what gets suspended.
• Design the order of restoration and the decision authority for when the usual decider is unreachable.
• Develop the pack of access, contacts and documents that must be available without the office.
• Apply a set of messages drafted in advance for customers, staff and suppliers.
• Evaluate the plan through a short simulation and correct what fails.

Agenda

1. 01Minimum operation: what holds and what is suspended
2. 02Order of restoration
3. 03Decision authority during the interruption
4. 04Access, credentials and documents kept off site
5. 05Talking to customers, staff and suppliers
6. 06Temporary manual work and how it is reconciled afterwards
7. 07The test exercise: short, uncomfortable, useful
8. 08What gets reviewed once things are normal again

What the organisation leaves with

• A written definition of the minimum operation and the order of restoration.
• A line of decision authority with defined limits.
• A pack of access details, contacts and documents held outside the office.
• Draft messages for customers, staff and suppliers, written before they are needed.