Catastrophic events – both natural and man-made – occur in many forms and may severely affect a company’s ability to conduct its normal business. And given today’s global business environment, a local catastrophic event can have far-reaching consequences. As such, companies need to be prepared to respond to any event with an integrated catastrophe response plan that recognizes the various types of impacts on their organization and have appropriate resources at hand to help them to manage their response and recovery.
Catastrophes demanding this type of response can be defined as events that cause significant impact to property, life and/or business operations, and result in significant financial impact to a company or geographic region. While this may include events ranging from industrial accidents to terrorist attacks to massive product recalls, next month’s 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina serves as a stark reminder of the destruction and business continuity issues that can arise from a large natural catastrophe.