COSE Update - September 2008 - (Page 15)

Mock trials throughout the year ensure that Lubrizol is primed to manage business interruptions. Tabletop drills last four hours and are followed by a critique to address what worked and what didn’t. Fullscale drills conducted annually can last six to eight hours. “The important part is critique,” Shannon says. “You find out you have needs—that you don’t have people assigned to certain roles, for example.” For instance, Lubrizol learned from the August 2003 blackout that it needed a formal system for long-term power loss. They needed more emergency lighting, a buddy system so employees could walk through the plant safely, plenty of flashlights and a contact list of people to call for diesel to fuel generators. In the case of the CSX derailment, Lubrizol’s ECC team and dedicated employees worked through a practiced plan successfully—and they were stable enough to supply their services for disaster relief. “When you go through the what-if scenarios, develop a general plan with a command structure and assign roles and responsibilities, you can adjust the plan to the emergency,” Shannon advises. lessons learned 1. Test Your Plan. having a business contingency plan isn’t enough. you must test it and evaluate what worked, and what didn’t. “once you critique the process and bolster your plan, test it again,” says patrick shannon, health and safety emergency response supervisor at lubrizol. 2. Stay Connected. in the days of wireless, digital communication, the old-fashioned land line seems antiquated—but it’s safe. lubrizol learned that keeping a separate land line not connected to the digital phone system is handy in case of power loss or phone system malfunction. 3. “We maintain an analog phone number that comes into our security station,” marcsik says, referring back to the 2003 blackout when cell phone towers were down, as was the company’s main phone system. “We still had contact with emergency personnel and had a landline to get a hold of people.” Dessert Disaster or not olympia candy turned a power outage disaster into something sweet for business. rather than losing 120 gallons of ice cream showcased in their strongsville sweets parlor, celia and bob mcGrath shifted the showcases onto dollies, rolled them out to the front lawn and posted a sign that said, “free ice cream—tell your friends.” the mcGraths made quite a few friends that day, and won customer appreciation for turning a freezer failure into future business. at one time, the line was 50 people long. the mcGraths scooped ice cream until after midnight. (they positioned their car with headlights burning toward the stand so they could see.) ice cream stored in the sub-zero freezer wasn’t harmed by the power outage. neither was the chocolate, since the store was kept dark and the freezers not opened. because the mcGraths knew they would lose their showcase ice cream, they figured goodwill was a better option than wasting it, celia mcGrath says. “in times like that, you can choose to panic and wring your hands and wonder, ‘What do we do?’ or you can take action,” mcGrath says. “We made a statement by giving it away.” now, the mcGraths have a contingency plan in place for power outages. phone numbers for refrigeration experts are posted. a mechanism on the freezer alerts store workers when the temperature is too warm. “if it’s a fire—all bets are off,” mcGrath says, referring to chocolate’s melting point. “but we have taken steps to make sure we don’t lose money if something like that happens again.” in the meantime, the mcGraths enjoy when customers visit the store and remember the infamous free ice cream night. one couple recently visited and told mcGrath, “We stopped in to give you business because of what you did four years ago.” “in times like that, you can choose to panic and wring your hands and wonder, ‘What do we do?’ or you can take action.” — celia mcGrath , olympia canDies september 2008 • cose update • 15

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of COSE Update - September 2008

COSE Update - September 2008 Contents Memo Upfront Vision Tech Business Interrupted The “Bigness” of Small Business What’s the Plan? People Telecom Advocacy Communications Health Pipeline Connect Arts My Cause Plugged In

COSE Update - September 2008

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