Continuity Corner #5
Tuesday, September 11th, 2007In Remembrance of
September 11, 2001
As I typed the date for this blog entry…the memories that came flooding back to me are as vivid today 6 years after the 9/11 terrorist attacks as they were on September 11, 2002. I still have in my desk drawer, my ID cards that granted me access to The World Trade Center and to my then employer’s corporate facilities located there. Attached to these ID’s is the key to a ladies washroom on the 56 floor that I’ll never need again. Although I didn’t work permanently in the building, I visited enough to have been granted ongoing access.
Like so many people, even though I was 750 miles away from ground zero, 9/11 and the immediate days afterward, changed my life. Prior to 9/11, I had been a Director of Business Continuity Planning for one of the organization’s subsidiaries and like many parts of the organization; I was called upon to assist in the emergency response effort that began within the hour of the plane hitting the tower.
What was immediately evident was what makes any organization a family. The whereabouts of all the employees, contractors and visitors and whether they were injured and/or needed assistance was of paramount importance. In the days after the event, the media wanted to know if we had located all of our people and how many we may have lost. Secondarily to that, they wanted to know if we would be ready to open when the market reopened.
After I left the firm in 2003, my new career path was laid out for me. I started a consulting business providing Business Continuity Planning services for small and medium sized businesses. I knew first hand how much smoother, not easier, the tasks of emergency response and recovery can be when a company has taken the time to develop a plan and integrate the process into the entire business. I remember the simple thank you from so many employees who knew that the firm cared about them as we spoke with them over the first week after the disaster.
Since 9/11, areas of the United States have experienced crippling hurricanes, mudslides, massive power outages, tornados, fires and just about everything else that both Mother Nature and man can think of. But I still hear from businesses that they can’t afford to develop a plan, or they have a plan to recover their data and that is enough, or even, nothing is going to happen to their business. My response to that has become my two mantras, 1) ‘It’s not if something will happen to your business….it’s when.’ 2) ‘Without a plan, can you continue to support the people that rely on you and have placed their trust in you everyday……your employees and your customers?’
Everyone’s memories are personal today and a million stories can and have been told. I hope as many plans have now been written.
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