e-Communiqué

August/September 2006

Published exclusively for members of ACCED-I

Editor's Note: One year ago, in late August, Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast of the United States. Virtually shutting down the infrastructure of towns and cities along the coast, the hurricane didn't leave colleges and universities alone. Many ACCED-I members and institutions located in the region were displaced at some level due to the storm. ACCED-I member Patricia Arteaga authored the following article on "Planning for a Natural Disaster." She offers advice on steps to take when preparing for a natural disaster. She writes from experience, for her instituion is the University of New Orleans.

HOW UNO WEATHERED THE STORM

How did the University of New Orleans and the Lindy Boggs Conference Center weather the storm? UNO is located on the southern shore of Lake Pontchartrain and is higher in elevation than the center of the city. This resulted in only the southern edge of campus taking flood water.

The International Conference Center was affected by Katrina, but fortunately did not receive extensive damage. Most of the damage was caused by strong winds and a leaky roof. Patricia Arteaga, Coordinator of Conference Services said, “Unfortunately, our building is just now going through mold remediation and being tested for air quality. It will take a couple of months before we can go back to our usual daily business.”

The UNO Conference Services and the Lindy C. Boggs International Conference Center staff sustained losses too. Three student workers and two full-time employees lost their homes and had to re-locate. However, other staff members continue to operate from temporary offices in the main campus looking forward to a full recovery and the revitalization of New Orleans .

In late August 2005, Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans and the Gulf Coast as the costliest hurricane to ever strike the United States. This natural disaster changed people’s perception of how vulnerable we all are. Planning what you and your place of business will do during such events is very important.

The object of having a disaster plan is to establish procedures to minimize damage to your business and protect the lives of your office personnel. A plan should outline organizational and departmental plans that can be implemented in the event that a natural disaster arrives at your door step, literally. In all, the plan should outline actions to be taken prior to, during and after an actual disaster. The following are five very easy steps one can apply either in conjunction with your organization’s master plan, or on your own.

Five Easy Steps to Prepare Your Office

1. You need to have a plan!

Your office and staff needs to plan, prepare and practice your disaster plan. This will be the foundation of your office continuity, and the only effective way to diffuse the impact of any type of disaster you might have to go through (hurricanes, earthquakes, floods, fires, etc). Having a contingency plan will ensure the continuity of your office operations. This plan should extend to all parts of the services and type of business you provide from your office.

• Identify critical/key personnel
• Select essential data and files to routinely store offsite (for our office this includes just backing up files and essential data on a flash drive or zip drive).
• Organize a planning team within your office. Key personnel should be part of this planning team.
• Once the plan has been created, you need to test and practice your plan. Remember PRACTICE makes PERFECT! No plan is effective if it is not practiced and properly executed.
• Educate your team through training. Like many college conference centers, we hire students to do office work during the school semesters. It is important to provide them with a manual/booklet of your plan so they are aware of what needs to be done in case of a disaster.

2. Backup your software

Our office didn’t have as many problems as other organizations during hurricane Katrina; we backed up our software a week before Katrina. By the time we were back and had the use of our network we had access to our office data and software. An office without access to data or software will come to a screeching halt very quickly. Make sure that backups are performed in a timely manner and that they are stored in a facility that is safe, secure, and dependable. Our department is very small, but we have our I/S student worker who does a backup every week.

Have a list of all your software providers/vendors so you can call them to request a copy of the software your office needs in order to do business. For most of us this would include software such as registration and or/conference booking software.

3. Protect your office site

Our Conference Center Director knew what she had in mind when she decided to have a secure alarm system for our conference center. Protecting your site facilities and equipment is instrumental in continuing or restoring operations in the event of a disaster.

Depending on the size of your office/organization, things to consider are boarding and mitigation or even complete shutdown procedures. Make sure that your plan includes post procedures too. You’ll need to have a start-up plan to facilitate re-occupation for after the disaster. In our case we are discovering this the hard way. Our offices were secure, but the mitigation, mold remediation, etc. is taking longer than expected. This is mostly, however, due to state regulations and politics.

4. Be able to operate remotely

This step was very important for our office. We’ve worked out of any available university space for the past 10 months, from our homes to the Chancellor’s office. Having laptops, wireless connections and cell-phones was essential for us to be operational. Inability to access your facility is a highly probable occurrence when you are going through a natural disaster such as a hurricane. Roads may be flooded or closed by authorities. Employees may be unable to leave their homes in a state of emergency or may be unwilling to leave their families. It is very important to plan for a scenario in which your business facility is operational but the employees are unable to get there.

One way to prepare for this contingency is to develop a method to operate the critical components of your business remotely. Modern technology will allow a laptop computer to function almost anywhere. In addition, cell phones, fax machines and voice mail are technologies that can be used from most employees’ homes if the event is anticipated, planned for and tested in advance.

5. Have an effective communication strategy

Communications are important to any business. In the event of a disaster, it becomes even more crucial. It is important to maintain communication with everyone in your office, to warn employees of impending danger, to inform families and off-duty personnel about what’s happening, as well as customers and clients. In this case, it is very important to inform clients of the immediate concurrencies after a disaster.

Be aware of the possible impact on clients if communications are inoperable. Establish procedures and action plans to accommodate this occurrence. Whether you are a small office or part of a large company, you need to make sure that you will have a method of communication in place in the event of a natural disaster.

Conclusion: Overall, you need to remain flexible and adaptable. You should also remember that the nature of the type of disaster affecting your area will influence your recovery direction. The impact on city management, politicians and university employers will determine what your plans will be; you’ll need to be adaptable and able to move on accordingly. Furthermore, do not make assumptions and do not hesitate to act. Remember, be prepared, plan and act.