Andrew Krosp, Mike Davis, Graham Daniels ISDS 3100 Group Assignment Phase 1. Question 1:

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1 Andrew Krosp, Mike Davis, Graham Daniels ISDS 3100 Group Assignment Phase 1 Question 1: When we are talking about emergency response plans we are usually referring to the actions that are taken in the times of a crisis. These actions should be in a rapid fashion, considering that every moment that passes the crisis has the possibility of becoming worse and affecting more people than it already has. Most of the time, when a crisis happens there are negative effects that happen to those who are affected. We rarely see positive effects on the people who are affected by a crisis. When we first come across a crisis, the first action that we would take in the emergency response plan is usually to assess the risk. This allows you to see how you would like to handle the situation, and what actions you should implement. After you have assessed the situation you must then implement your emergency plans to help stabilize the situation. This stabilization will help you to try to limit the damage that the crisis may cause. How you stabilize the situation depends on the kind of crisis that is at hand. The emergency response plan will look very different for a situation like the building being on fire, than if the whole computer system crashed. For each company there would be a unique sense of their own way to handle their situation, because no two companies are exactly the same. For Shell Oil Company, oil spills are the biggest problem that they face as a company in terms of a crisis. For oil spills, an emergency response plan is a necessity, without it the oil spill could grow into a major incident and affect the ecosystem in a major way. Not only would it harm the landscape, but it could also harm the animals that live in the area. The oil spill would also affect the economic standing of the company with the money lost due to damages and the negative outlook that it places on the company. Shell Oil Company is a company that is in relation with the Bureau of Safety and Environment Enforcement Oil Spill Preparedness Division. This BSEE requires that Shell has a response plan, the Oil Spill Response Plan (OSRP). The OSRP focuses a lot on the preparedness of the equipment that is being used. They also make sure that the people using the equipment know how to use it properly to try to limit the amount of accidents to a minimum. The OSRP provides these inspections to make sure that Shell Oil Company is also ready to respond to these possible oil spills. These inspections make sure that Shell Oil Company can perform the first part of the emergency response plan and assess the situation properly. The BSEE also oversees that Shell Oil Company s response equipment is up to par. So that after they assess the situation and understand that there is an oil spill,

2 the Shell Oil Company must then take action to clean up the oil spill. The BSEE makes sure that Shell s clean up products, like skimming products, are up to date and can effectively clean up the oil spill in accordance to their Oil Spill Response Plan (OSRP). This is the second step in the process, which pertains to stabilizing the situation. These skimmers help to contain the oil to a certain area and clean the already existing oil from the water. If we refer to the picture above, we can see an example of the skimmers that the Shell Oil Company uses to clean up an oil spill. There are different tactics that the skimmers use to contain the oil, and BSEE makes sure that Shell Oil Company can effectively execute the coordinated skimming tactics. With this emergency response plan, Shell Oil Company is able to limit the amount of damage that is done when a crisis presents itself. The faster and more efficient that the response plan is the less damage that the oil will do to its surrounding environment. There is never a good time to have an emergency but accidents happen. It is Shell Oil Company s job to minimize the risk of these accidents occurring and then minimizing the damage of these accidents when they do happen. Question 2: Resource management is the second and very important part of the Ready preparedness program, which was created by the department of homeland security. Resource management is concerned with the efficient, effective, and economic development of an organization s resources when they are needed. The resources used by companies such as Shell can be put into categories such as people, facilities, systems, equipment, materials, supplies, funding, and special expertise. For example, Shell used resources such as boats, skimmers, and specially trained employees to clean up the pollution caused by the oil spill in Gulf of Mexico in Resource can be broken down into two major categories: internal and external. Internal resources are resources such as people/employees, facilities owned by the company, and systems and equipment owned by the company, and materials and supplies owned by the company. External resources are resources outside the company such as public emergency service, contractors and vendors, and partnerships. The first thing a company must do in order to manage their resources efficiently and effectively is to conduct a needs assessment. A needs assessment is used to determine the availability and the capability of the resources that are needed for a specific time. Some resources are needed immediately others can be bought and stored for when they are needed. The availability of resources depends on logistics.

3 Logistics is the management of resources to get them where they are needed when they are needed. Companies must also review programs goals and performance objectives when assessing the resources needed. For example, some of Shell s goals and objectives are the safety of employees, protection of its facilities, great customer service, positive brand image, and the prevention of environmental pollution. According to The Department of Homeland Security, when the needs assessment is completed it should answer the following questions: what quantity of a resource is required, when will the resource be needed, what capability does the resource need to have? Are there any limitations? What is the cost for producing or having the resources available? Are there any liabilities associated with the use of the resource? Shell uses resource management on a constant basis. In order for Shell to run as efficiently and as effectively as possible they must monitor their resources very closely. If Shell doesn t monitor their resources closely it could cause unnecessary costs. Along with causing unnecessary costs poor resource management can lead to major disasters such as oil spills, which can ruin a company like Shell s brand image and cause them to lose an abundant amount of customers. Question 3: Crisis can become present at any moment in time. How you react to these crisis can show how your business can handle the situation at hand. A big portion of the response is the way that a business communicates about the problem at hand. If the crisis communication plan is not in place then your response to the crisis could be hindered and cause the crisis to grow worse than what it was. The crisis communication plan is how the company will communicate the situation to everyone that could be affected. These people would probably include the employees, the customers, the surrounding area of the incident, and if the incident is major enough the government. If these people were to not given the information about the crisis it could harm them in many different ways. For the Shell Oil Company, a major crisis that occurs for their company is oil spills. The actions that would be taken by Shell during an oil spill would be to first have the workers around the area communicate with the headquarters for that area, and the workers would then take the precautionary measures and crisis actions that they were trained to do. The headquarters would then communicate to the people surrounding the area about the possible dangers that they could be exposed to and to evacuate the area. Shell Oil Company would then communicate to the government about the situation and how they are taking the precautions to contain the spill, so that it does not spread to other areas. After Shell Oil Company has the situation contained they should inform the public with the information about the crisis and how it will affect the company and other people. Through

4 this communication plan, Shell Oil Company will try to achieve four things. As seen in the diagram above they will focus on the message they want to communicate, how they will communicate these through different channels, the people they are targeting with the message, and the objectives of what the communication plan should achieve. If Shell Oil Company does this in an effective manner then it will help limit the crisis to minimal damage. Much of the crisis communication plan also deals with how the company deals with how they are seen in the public eye. For big companies that make a major impact on a certain sector, they are viewed in the public eye on a daily basis. If they are seen in a positive outlook by the public, the success of their business can directly correlate with this in terms of improved revenue and stock prices. But if the business is looked at in a negative manner, then they businesses revenues and stock prices can decline significantly. This perception is usually formed from how the company responds to the situation and how they communicate the crisis to the public. The more informative and honest the company is about the situation, usually helps improve the public s perception of the situation and the company as a whole. In 2016, the Shell Oil Company spilled 2,100 barrels worth of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. But the Shell Oil Company learned from BP s oil spill that it needed to be handled in a different way than BP had previously done. BP did not communicate their information about their oil spill effectively and honestly and this caused the public opinion of BP to decline immensely. It was reflected by their revenues and also the sharp decline of their stock price. Instead, Shell Oil Company effectively communicated the problem and how they were fixing the problem to the public. While there was still a negative outlook from the public on Shell Oil Company, it was not anywhere near the negative outlook that BP received, nor did it hinder the company for as long. Question 4: One of the most underrated and over looked aspects of the Ready preparedness program happens to be one of the most important steps in the program, which is business continuity planning. Business continuity planning has to do with the future of the company and the continuation of the company s business practices after a business has been disrupted by a crisis or a disaster. Unplanned events can throw a business off track and cause them to incur costs and reduce profits. Creating a business continuity plan to continue business functions is essential. Creating a business continuity plan consists of four steps. The first step is business continuity impact analysis. Business continuity impact analysis looks at the effects resulting from the disruption of business functions and processes, and uses the information to make decisions about recovery priorities and strategies. The second step is to identify, document, and implement to recover critical business functions and processes. Business continuity impact analysis consists of worksheets that summarize the operational and financial impacts resulting from the loss of business functions and processes while also identifying the point in time when loss of a function or process would result in the identified business impacts. Once the company identifies and documents the necessary information, they move onto the recovery phase. The third step is to organize a business continuity team and compile a business continuity

5 plan. After a business is disrupted they must gather resources such as people, facilities, equipment, and materials to start the recovery process. Businesses should analyze their resources to identify any gaps that could hinder the recovery process. There are several strategies that businesses can take for recovery. Strategies for recovery include, but are not limited: contracting with third parties, telecommunicating, entering into partnerships, using space from another facility, and utilizing other owned or controlled facilities performing similar tasks. The final step is to conduct training for the business continuity team and testing and exercises to evaluate recovery strategies and the plan. Shell has been extremely successful in business continuity planning and scenario planning. Shell prepares itself for any and every possible scenario that they can think of that may affect their business functions. For example, Shell predicted a oil price shock after the Yom Kippur War in The shock caused many oil companies to incur losses, but Shell was one of the few oil companies that was prepared for the price shock. This prediction and the preparation that Shell took to minimize the effects of the shock allowed them to move from being one of the weaker oil companies to one of the most profitable oil companies in the world. Another example of Shell responding to a disaster is the response after the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Shell responded immediately to the oil pill and took every action needed to clean the coast. After the cleaning the disaster on the Gulf of Mexico Shell took action to better its company by working on better response methods and training special employees in case a spill were to happen again. Even when Shell cannot predict a disaster, they still are extremely good at taking the steps needed to recover from the disaster and continue business operations. Below is a Diagram describing the four steps of a business continuity plan.

6 Works Cited "BSEE Inspects Oil Spill Response Equipment Staged to Support Shell's Chukchi Sea Oil Spill Response Plan." Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement Promoting Safety, Protecting the Environment and Conserving Offshore Resources. N.p., n.d. Web. 03 Mar Reuters. "Shell Spills Nearly 90,000 Gallons Of Oil Into Gulf Of Mexico." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 12 May Web. 03 Mar "Shell Celebrates 40 Years of Scenarios." Shell Global. N.p., n.d. Web. 03 Mar "Shell Demonstrates Arctic Spill Response Capabilities." The Maritime Executive. N.p., n.d. Web. 03 Mar