Business Continuity

NEDRIX (NorthEast Disaster Recovery Information X-Change) completed a survey of its membership on May 5, 2009 regarding their organization’s response to the potential pandemic due to the H1N1 virus.  100 members completed the survey and it is interesting to see how these organizations have responded to date.  The results published in the survey report are reassuring: most organizations are taking the potential pandemic seriously and are responding in a calm and controlled manner.  Implicit in the survey results, and based on individual comments from survey participants, are that these organizations are monitoring the situation for all operating locations worldwide.  This task is often assigned to the Pandemic Response Team or a Crisis Management team.

As expected at this phase of event, the top actions organizations are taking revolve around protecting staff from infection at the workplace – 95% are communicating to staff regarding H1N1 and the precautions to be taken to avoid infection, 81% made hand sanitizers available in all public areas, 46% stepped up cleaning activities in public areas and 91% encourage staff to stay home if they are sick (23% require a doctor’s note to return to work if they had flu symptoms).  Buying personal hygiene supplies such as masks, hand sanitizer, single-use thermometers, single-use visitor badges and the like are common steps at this point in implementing a pandemic response plan. 

There is a large difference in how organizations handle that sick time: 70% require the employee to use their own sick time versus 21% who do not.  Addressing policies such as sick time and requiring an employee to leave the workplace if sick and the resulting handling of the time away from work is an area that organizations need to work through with HR and Legal departments.  One organization commented that  they extended their sick time allowance to accommodate more time off due to a pandemic.

Travel restrictions are being implemented as well: 70% of survey participants require approval to travel from the US to other countries and 22% require approval to travel from other countries to the US.  Reactions from organizations at large are asking staff to curtail all non-essential travel for the time being.

Working from home is another area that the NEDRIX survey participants, and organizations at large, are instituting at higher rates - for essential staff as well as those staying home due to school closures.   Now is the time – before a pandemic strikes – to test work-at-home technical and business procedures set up as part of the pandemic response plan.  If you haven’t set up these procedures and solutions, it can be too late for your organization if a pandemic strikes soon.

One survey participant commented that they issued anti-viral medication to its workforce.  No attribution was given for that organization, but best-guess is that it is either a healthcare provider or government agency.

Finally, one survey participant commented that they have business operations in Mexico; therefore, their pandemic response plan implementation is further along due to Mexico being the foci of the event.

Read the entire survey report for more nuggets of information to enhance your organization’s pandemic response plan.