Kenyon Emergency Services exists to help people when they need it most, helping to restore order with compassion and upholding the dignity of those affected by crises and disasters.
Having experienced people by your side when a crisis hits is vital to navigating the unpredictable, difficult and emotional challenges organisations often face in such situations. Kenyon provides clients with assurance and support during an emergency or crisis situations, and driven by a commitment to humanity, we support clients, their employees and families long after the initial response. When the blue lights have gone, the smoke has faded, and the media has left, the effects of disasters linger. For those affected, the impact of the crisis never truly leaves them, and that’s when Kenyon’s role becomes even more vital. We provide the continued care and guidance that people need as they begin to rebuild their lives.
Managing a Crisis
Kenyon’s ‘12 Principles of Crisis Management’ are key to understanding how your business can best prepare for, and manage, times of crisis with care and compassion whilst maintaining business continuity.
A crisis isn’t just the event, and the consequences are far reaching, well beyond what most of us can imagine; from the loss of a life, impact on employees and mental health, business disruption, financial and loss of reputation, these are all too often the facets of crisis. As a business, you do not get to control the incidents occurrence, its timeliness or initial impact, but what you can control is the crisis response to it.
Emergency Response Plans
When you are responding to an incident, the People, Environment, Assets and the business Reputation (PEAR) all need appropriate consideration, management and support to prevent an incident becoming more significant than immediate impact turning into a major business crisis. Whether you call your planned response to an incident an “emergency, incident or crisis response plan”, it is crucial in all types of plans that thorough consideration, consequences and implications are all factored, captured and detailed. This ensures that clear, concise, easily executable actions are sequentially structured, in easy to follow unambiguous steps.
Humanitarian Services
Despite best plans and endeavours, exercises and high states of readiness, it is inevitable that some types of incidents will create a crisis and lead to consequences that impact employees, families of employees, clients or the general public. Family assistance support is a vital component of preparedness and response that can help calm an otherwise extreme situation. The four fundamental concerns outlined in the revised Family Assistance Framework are:
• Notification of Involvement
• Victim Accounting
• Information and Resources
• Personal Effects
It is imperative during a crisis response that the right services are provided to assist families, friends and survivors during this difficult time; family assistance services and support must be at the centre of any response. It is a business’s responsibility to treat affected people with respect and dignity, meet their needs, provide honest and correct information and help them come to terms with the consequences of events. As a minimum, businesses should provide a Family and Friends Reception Centre as soon as possible during crisis, then a Family Assistance Centre where families and loved ones can go to receive ongoing, accurate and clearly communicated information and updates.
Equally, consideration of the injured, walking wounded and the uninjured survivors of an incident, there needs are different in many ways, and therefore a Survivor Reception Centre (SRC) following an incident is crucial. Preparation of the SRC must be well considered, medical support, mental health, therapists, psychologists, spiritual, religious and cultural needs as well as somewhere that loved ones can reunite with those survivors are crucial.
International Call Centre Services
Whilst those affected by crisis are being supported and protected, one of the biggest complexities to navigate is the understandable volume of requests for information from concerned friends and family, as well as the media. One of Kenyon’s 12 Principles of Crisis Management is Call Centre Operations, and ensuring that a professional, serviceable, well organised, staffed and equipped call centre is up and running within a matter of hours following a major incident. Having an activation plan in place for a call centre to be set up in the event of an incident is key to ensuring you can respond swiftly with trained agents who can act with compassion and care. Incident call centres can receive 30,000+ calls within the first 24 hours of an incident. History has proven that attempting to communicate with loved ones, friends, and the media, during crisis, if not handled professionally can be the single biggest reputation and business ending aspect of any crisis. Ensuring the flow of accurate and timely information, that is delivered in a sensitive, compassionate and empathic manner is not only expected, it is fundamental to the situational management of a crisis. Crisis Communications to the media through statements and press conferences is key to calming any situation, conveying accurate messages and providing relevant information in a timely manner.
Personal Effects
A hugely important aspect of crisis management is that of the recovery, identification, preparation and presentation of the Personal Effects of the affected, and returning them to the families following an incident. The Personal Effects of a deceased family member may be all they have to hold onto of the loved one’s memories or help them come to terms with the events and feel closer to those lost. Having responded to many incidents from airline crashes to bombings and fires, Kenyon has significant experience in managing the Personal Effects process from the initial stages of retrieving items from the site, to cleaning and restoring personal effects and reuniting them with the families. Every item has a story, something very simple and seemingly insignificant in its appearance, a watch, a pen, even a button, can mean the world to a loved one and help them navigate the years of bereavement ahead of them.
Business Continuity
Too often businesses fail to put business continuity at the heart of the crisis response and fail. Business Continuity is vital for so many reasons, not least that further crisis can result if a business is unable to continue to function, airports, airlines, railways, and many other service provision business are essential to day to day activities, and in some cases can themselves be a key element of a response to crisis. In some crisis, the business continuing to function can be the difference between an incident response being effective or being a contributing element of the incident becoming a crisis.
Business Continuity is important, and what happens next even more so. Businesses need to plan as to how they would operate during and after a major incident, how to look after their own people and how to build back any reputation lost. How do you prepare to ensure you can continue day to day operations? Ensuring finances are in order and insurances in place, reviewing marketing campaigns to ensure they are appropriate and convey messages that fit with the new reality are some key components.
In addition to providing critical services to clients during a crisis, Kenyon also provide training on all aspects of crisis management at one of its two training academies (Bracknell and Houston) or on premises at business locations.
To understand more about Kenyon’s services and training courses, specifically the 12 Principles of Crisis Management, contact us today at kenyon@kenyoninternational.com.