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12 things to consider when buying an Incident Response Software

How are you trying to help in your organisation? It is important to understand what your organisation is trying to fix before thinking about sourcing an appropriate incident response solution. So identifying your organisation incident response needs is the first place to start: Does your organisation have a problem getting information through to the right people during an incident? Does your organisation struggle with responding to an incident in an effective manner? Do your teams constantly struggle to access up to date documents, drawings, information etc.? Once a more detailed plan has been identified, then you can start thinking about an incident response software that can help aid your organisation. Have you explored in-house options? In our experience that SharePoint, …

10 Tips – Creating Great Crisis Management Team Workflows

Workflows, when done right can provide enormous support to your crisis management team when they are called to respond to incidents / crises. So, we’ve produced for you 10 workflow tips to support your crisis management procedures:   1. Think executive summary not “War and Peace” – Your crisis management team spend most of their time working on the business and not necessarily in the business, so when your preparing your workflows, keep it concise and to the point. 2. Make the workflow role specific – Each member of the team is expected to respond to crises as per plan. Build workflows that will support their decision-making and demonstrate compliance with the established plans. 3. K.I.S.S. – Before ICR™, I …

Crisis Management Teams need to use workflows

When most people think of workflows they think of complicated flowcharts but we think of workflows like a checklist that can support your crisis management team during an incident. For us, each step in a workflow has a specific step before it and a specific step after it, with the exception of the first step. In a linear workflow (which is a checklist), the first step is usually initiated by an outside event i.e. an incident which results in someone having to do something. That person follows the workflow step by step until the incident comes to a close. So, here are 5 reasons why your crisis management team need workflows: Incidents don’t happen that often – Your senior leadership …

Manage Business Continuity Incidents & Reduce Risk

How to manage Business Continuity incidents better Every Business has a Rhythm Businesses by and large operate in steady state i.e. there is a rhythm to their normal operations that has developed over time. Manufacturers produce goods, goods are delivered to customers, customers consume those goods and in turn create further demand for manufacturers. In the background people and process support the activities of the business to ensure that the rhythm is maintained. But what if an Incident occurs? For these businesses, incidents can disrupt the rhythm of a company, disappoint customers and lead to unplanned costs. Ultimately this isn’t good for business. And because incidents come in all manner of shapes and sizes such as IT Incidents (payment systems going down for …

‘Planning for the worst, hoping for the best’ – maximising the security and safety of your students

In the last few months’ campuses around the globe have been subjected to bomb threats, arson attacks, racially aggravated incidents, lone shooter incidents, as well as cyber-attacks – the list goes on and on. Some institutions have responded well, communicated clearly, having dealt with the incident appropriately and efficiently, thus reinforcing their reputation within the education sector. Others, less so and their reputation could suffer irreparable damage as a result. The safety of students and institution reputation go hand in hand It’s easy in both a professional capacity and daily life capacity to adopt an ‘it won’t happen to us’ attitude but no one is safe from the dangers schools face in this modern world. If you think that these …

Evolution of Incident Management Software

Early Beginnings Nearly five years ago I asked a customer……”would you take this as an app?”, the fact he said “Yes” has made a profound impact on my professional career in the time since. You see, we had been struggling to come up with a clever way of giving out incident response plans to the senior management team (…..easy part) and a clever way of keeping the information in those plans up to date (…..not so easy part).  It also had to be with them 24/7/365 (…the really difficult part). You could call it a moment of inspiration, but more than likely it was a moment of opportunism (…..the senior management team had just received their shiny new iPhone 4’s the week …

ICR Fire & Rescue Shortlisted for 2014 ISA Awards

Hi, We’re incredibly excited to announce that ICR: Fire & Rescue has been shortlisted for this year’s Irish Software Awards under the Digital Technology Services Project of the Year Category which recognises projects that have delivered outstanding value to an end client (public or private sector) through the innovative use of digital technology. Over the past 18 months, ICR has been working tirelessly to support the men & women of the Irish Fire Services in their day to day operations when dealing with all manner of incidents, with a specific focus on health & safety as well as cost reductions. It’s the first end to end mobile solution specifically developed for the needs of our emergency services as a result of thousands of hours capturing the industry’s exact …

Getting your Team in the Boardroom

We work in a 24/7/365 environment which is further compounded by the necessity to travel as part of our work. In a recent survey of our clients in the pharmaceutical & manufacturing Industry, we found that Senior Management / Director Level employees spent an average of 24% of the operating hours of their site, by being actually on site!. The remainder of the time is spent travelling along with evenings & weekends spent at home. So in the event of emergency these responsible persons are removed from the detail of the incident, relying on multiple telephone calls, SMS, Email’s and vague descriptions of the developing situation. The consequences of failing to understand in “real time”, the scale of the emergency or the impact it may have …

Accidents & Emergencies – Quantifying Costs

If a major emergency were to occur tonight at your facility……how confident would you be of your management staff addressing the incident effectively as per your company’s policies and procedures whilst at the same time minimizing the costs associated with the Incident? For many organisations the cost of these incidents are largely very difficult to quantify, along with the unquantifiable cost of human life in the event of a major incident. Also, it is the scale of the and breadth of the costs across departments and add up that really affects the bottom line of a company. Below you will find a non exhaustive list of costs associated with the incidents, if you’d like to add to the list please contact me …