Ask the Expert: Patti Earley, CAFM^®, NAFA Senior Vice President

After a disaster, the most important mission is getting people’s lives back to normal as quickly as possible. For most organizations, restoration of daily functions doesn’t happen without the fleet. While there may be some advanced warning with hurricanes, most disasters don’t give you notice before they strike. It is crucial to the success of your recovery efforts to have your emergency operations plans in place.

NAFA Senior Vice President Patti Earley, CAFM^®, offers some crucial needs to consider:

• Plan, plan, plan, and then practice that plan. Have a dry run or table top exercise to ensure everyone knows their role and your expectations.
• Make sure your strategy is comprehensive and flexible enough to cover any crisis from natural disasters to man-made tragedies.
• Don’t forget details like:
  • How do you function if critical employees can’t report to work?
  • How do you handle repairs/replacement of damaged vehicles?
  • Have you made arrangements to feed your employees?
  • If your facility is damaged, where will you move your operations?
  • If cell towers are down, how are you communicating?
  • What arrangements do you have to fuel employee and fleet vehicles if no fuel is available commercially?
  • Do you have access to generators if you have a power outage?
• Determine the resources you may need and have contracts in place to obtain those resources quickly. You may want to engage vendors that are out of your immediate area so they aren’t dealing with the same crisis you are.

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