Planning: Training
An integral component of implementing your emergency plan is making sure that your employees are trained in executing it. Such training can incorporate a wide variety of activities, ranging from periodic meetings to review procedures, to more intensive activities such as evacuation drills and emergency exercises. Training for all employees should address a number of key issues:
- Roles and responsibilities during an emergency.
- Awareness information about threats and hazards addressed in the plan.
- Communications procedures, including notification and warning systems.
- Review of emergency contact information.
- Review of emergency response procedures, including those for evacuation and shelter.
- Training in the use of common emergency equipment, such as fire extinguishers – make sure your employees know where this equipment is located.
- Emergency shutdown procedures, to ensure smooth post-emergency continuity.
Training activities might take a variety of forms, and when used in tandem, these activities can help to ensure that emergency response procedures are cemented in the minds of your employees. Some typical activities that you might include in your training program include the following:
- Orientation Sessions, in which new employees are briefed on emergency response procedures. Supporting documentation should be developed for new employees to review and keep on file.
- Education Sessions, which focus on specific aspects of your emergency response plan. These sessions might take the form of formal employee meetings, participative workshops, or informal "brown-bag lunches." You may also want to consider asking local emergency management or response personnel to speak at these events.
- Tabletop Exercises, in which members of the emergency management planning group meet to discuss responsibilities and actions in emergency situations. This exercise is often a valuable prelude to other, more time-intensive training activities.
- Walk-through and Functional Drills, where employees actually perform emergency functions in response to pre-planned scenarios. A more intensive version of such a drill, known as a full-scale exercise could include community response organizations as well.
- Evacuation Drills, in which employees walk their prescribed emergency evacuation routes, noting elements that could become hazardous in an emergency.
All of the activities described above should be followed by evaluations. The data gained through evaluations can then be used to modify and improve the existing emergency plan.
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