Role of the private sector (Exercise 24 Europe: test not real)
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Luke Beckman
Mar 31, 2011, 2:23:08 AM3/31/11
to l...@eushare.org, o...@eushare.org, part...@eushare.org, Peter Ohtaki
The private sector (corporations, businesses, etc...) has been thinking about how to ramp operations back to normal since the moment disaster struck. Every minute wasted, or every minute a plant, machine, or operation sits idle is lost revenue.
Some of the main issues that executives will be asking are
1. Employees: Are my employees OK? Can they work? Are they still in the area? Are they healthy?
2. Customers: Are my customers in a position to provide me with business? (is money available?)
3. What kind of financing, banking, and lending is available? Is their power and signal for credit card and wire transactions? (In many places, especially with weaker economies, if banking is not restarted immediately, the entire economy stops. Period.)
4. Is my supply chain intact? Can I get my goods to market? Can I ship by road, sea, or air? Do my good spoil?
5. Do I have power, network connectivity, stable/sturdy buildings, functioning machinery to continue operations?
Some things that can help with these issues...
1. Public/private partnerships- get businesses talking to government and response groups "before the bad thing happens" so that alternatives can be thought out and institutionalized.
2. Short-term lending options to get cash moving in the economy, and to allow businesses to invest free capital in repairing or returning assets and resource levels to normal.
3. Well-developed contingency plans to keep employees near the workplace, with adequate resources to support not only them, but also their families.
**Response agencies and governments should immediately look to business in the affected area to see what kinds of resources are sitting idle. These partnerships can be extremely strong, resilient, and rewarding. For example, a company may have multiple dumptrucks, bulldozers, generators, fabrication machines, servers, shipping resources, recycling machinery, etc... that are sitting idle that could be put to great use!**
In poorer countries, it is even that more essential to get people to work. Short-term development programs, rather than sending in external responders or foreign contractors, should look to hire and train as many locals as possible. Ideally, if this is a business that can be sustained well into the recovery and reconstruction phase, the program will have that much of a greater chance for success.
WARNING: There will also be companies that look to reap benefits off of the suffering of others. This is a sad, but true fact. Prices of goods will natrually be driven up, but some will work to cut out competition (there won't be much to start with in some areas) and this shoots prices through the roof, or they artificially jump prices. Some companies will also severely overprice contracts or drag work out. (I've seen plenty of this).
The important thing to remember, though, is that corporations are not inherently evil. You will see the best and worst of humanity out there, but business is critical to a successful reconstruction operation.
Please continue to expand and iterate on this short and wholly inadequate synopsis. I would love to hear what policies, procedures, lessons learned, etc that others have seen occur following major crises.
The more things we can share here, the better off we will all be.
-Luke
Some of the main issues that executives will be asking are
1. Employees: Are my employees OK? Can they work? Are they still in the area? Are they healthy?
2. Customers: Are my customers in a position to provide me with business? (is money available?)
3. What kind of financing, banking, and lending is available? Is their power and signal for credit card and wire transactions? (In many places, especially with weaker economies, if banking is not restarted immediately, the entire economy stops. Period.)
4. Is my supply chain intact? Can I get my goods to market? Can I ship by road, sea, or air? Do my good spoil?
5. Do I have power, network connectivity, stable/sturdy buildings, functioning machinery to continue operations?
Some things that can help with these issues...
1. Public/private partnerships- get businesses talking to government and response groups "before the bad thing happens" so that alternatives can be thought out and institutionalized.
2. Short-term lending options to get cash moving in the economy, and to allow businesses to invest free capital in repairing or returning assets and resource levels to normal.
3. Well-developed contingency plans to keep employees near the workplace, with adequate resources to support not only them, but also their families.
**Response agencies and governments should immediately look to business in the affected area to see what kinds of resources are sitting idle. These partnerships can be extremely strong, resilient, and rewarding. For example, a company may have multiple dumptrucks, bulldozers, generators, fabrication machines, servers, shipping resources, recycling machinery, etc... that are sitting idle that could be put to great use!**
In poorer countries, it is even that more essential to get people to work. Short-term development programs, rather than sending in external responders or foreign contractors, should look to hire and train as many locals as possible. Ideally, if this is a business that can be sustained well into the recovery and reconstruction phase, the program will have that much of a greater chance for success.
WARNING: There will also be companies that look to reap benefits off of the suffering of others. This is a sad, but true fact. Prices of goods will natrually be driven up, but some will work to cut out competition (there won't be much to start with in some areas) and this shoots prices through the roof, or they artificially jump prices. Some companies will also severely overprice contracts or drag work out. (I've seen plenty of this).
The important thing to remember, though, is that corporations are not inherently evil. You will see the best and worst of humanity out there, but business is critical to a successful reconstruction operation.
Please continue to expand and iterate on this short and wholly inadequate synopsis. I would love to hear what policies, procedures, lessons learned, etc that others have seen occur following major crises.
The more things we can share here, the better off we will all be.
-Luke
Chris Maxin
Mar 31, 2011, 2:25:28 AM3/31/11
to Luke Beckman, l...@eushare.org, o...@eushare.org, part...@eushare.org, Peter Ohtaki
All,
Please add "#X24Europe Test-Not Real" hash tag to all communications.
George Bressler
Mar 31, 2011, 2:42:38 AM3/31/11
to l...@eushare.org, o...@eushare.org, part...@eushare.org, Peter Ohtaki
Luke,
Can you post the links to the four forms on Twitter and facebook
#X24Europe TEST NOT REAL then the link?
Great job!
Thanks,
George
Christoph Dennenmoser
Mar 31, 2011, 2:55:21 AM3/31/11
to o...@eushare.org, l...@eushare.org, part...@eushare.org, Peter Ohtaki
A very important input, Luke!
These are some of the lessons learned of former disasters: Not to "flood" a country with goods from outside but to use and rebuild local ressources.
Any further inputs welcome!
George Bressler
Mar 31, 2011, 3:38:25 AM3/31/11
to l...@eushare.org, part...@eushare.org, o...@eushare.org, Peter Ohtaki
Absolutely!
Cat Graham
Mar 31, 2011, 4:02:02 AM3/31/11
to X24 Europe Cluster: Operations
Great job on the forms.. very nice. I know that during UN deployment
the public contacts can get literally spammed and slammed with
emails. In a real-time event much of this data would need to be
behind the front door so to speak to avoid that. I suspect this would
be part of a design consideration. When the UN engages they have
their own protocols but the teams inevitably drift into google groups
or other public chat areas to allow for interaction from private
sector. Having this type of concept available is great. Third party
have/need sites also engage. Just wanted to say kudos on building in
the forms and functionality for the exercise!
Logistics
#X24Europe TEST NOT REAL Logistics Cluster Roster
https://sites.google.com/a/eushare.org/x24test/logistics-cluster-roster-test-not-real
Transport
#X24Europe TEST NOT REAL Transport
https://sites.google.com/a/eushare.org/x24test/critical-transportation-items-for-x24europe-test-not-real
Assets on the Ground
#X24Europe TEST NOT REAL Assets on the ground
https://sites.google.com/a/eushare.org/x24test/assets-on-the-ground
Have/Need
#X24Europe TEST NOT REAL Logistics Have/need form
https://sites.google.com/a/eushare.org/x24test/test-tools
Medical Facilities Form
X24Europe TEST NOT REAL medical facilities form
https://sites.google.com/a/eushare.org/x24test/medical-facilities(Join
in!)
the public contacts can get literally spammed and slammed with
emails. In a real-time event much of this data would need to be
behind the front door so to speak to avoid that. I suspect this would
be part of a design consideration. When the UN engages they have
their own protocols but the teams inevitably drift into google groups
or other public chat areas to allow for interaction from private
sector. Having this type of concept available is great. Third party
have/need sites also engage. Just wanted to say kudos on building in
the forms and functionality for the exercise!
Logistics
#X24Europe TEST NOT REAL Logistics Cluster Roster
https://sites.google.com/a/eushare.org/x24test/logistics-cluster-roster-test-not-real
Transport
#X24Europe TEST NOT REAL Transport
https://sites.google.com/a/eushare.org/x24test/critical-transportation-items-for-x24europe-test-not-real
Assets on the Ground
#X24Europe TEST NOT REAL Assets on the ground
https://sites.google.com/a/eushare.org/x24test/assets-on-the-ground
Have/Need
#X24Europe TEST NOT REAL Logistics Have/need form
https://sites.google.com/a/eushare.org/x24test/test-tools
Medical Facilities Form
X24Europe TEST NOT REAL medical facilities form
https://sites.google.com/a/eushare.org/x24test/medical-facilities(Join
in!)
secretariat.thewalkingdrum
Apr 5, 2011, 12:33:25 AM4/5/11
to l...@eushare.org, o...@eushare.org, part...@eushare.org, Peter Ohtaki
----- Original Message -----From: Mike ChumerTo: l...@eushare.orgSent: Thursday, March 31, 2011 3:51 AMSubject: [X24 Logistics] Re: Role of the private sector (Exercise 24 Europe: test not real)Luke..all good discussion points...I am off to a symposium right now that we (NJIT), the BEOC Alliance, and MSA Speciialized Security Services are sponsoring at NJIT...the topic is Organizational Resilience and Security...many of the questions you pose will be addressed in one form or another....as you are aware the partnership we have under the umbrella of the BEOC (Business Emergency Operations Center)...consists of academia, private sector, military, and public sector entities...our mission in the BEOC Alliance is to advocate for the private sector during all emergency management dimensions ...we will be standing up several BEOC models during National Level Exercise 2011 and plan to incorporate many of the social media and crowd sourcing tools on display here at x24...we want to experiment with those tools and how to interface better social media with the more formal incident management structure...would love to continue this discussuion topic but it will need to be later...
Mike Chumer
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