Plan B: Ready For Anything
Author: Sandi Cain
March 2007
Features
Recent events have made the phrase ‘disaster preparedness’ synonymous with terrorism, hurricanes or the threat of avian flu. Yet you might just as easily face contingency plans due to labor unrest, food poisoning or cyber crime.
Often it’s the smaller things that might affect your meeting. Joan Eisenstodt, chief strategist for Washington, D.C.-based Eisenstodt & Associates and a former MPI board member, recalls a time she was giving a presentation about preparedness when the fire alarm went off. “Everyone thought I’d planned it, but I didn’t,” she says.
In San Jose, food poisoning during a recent convention received broad negative publicity and resulted in a lawsuit between the hotel and the group, even though the incident was traced to a single food handler. In Los Angeles last fall, airport engineers threatened a walkout that would have put a damper on airport operations, and a one-day labor demonstration blocked easy access to some airport-area hotels.
Any one of those things might have spelled disaster for a given meeting or convention. The plain truth is that the more prepared you are for the unexpected, the better you’ll be able to handle whatever might happen. In fact, panelists speaking at a session on preparedness during the recent International Association of Exhibitions and Events convention in San Diego emphasized that it’s not a matter of if something will go wrong, but when.
Simply developing a Plan B today is almost mandatory. But it needn’t be an onerous task. The easiest starting point may be to have staff pose “what if” scenarios and discuss solutions. “Just thinking about possibilities allows you to minimize the risk for the organization,” says Timothy Schneider, organizer of the annual TEAMS (Travel Events And Management in Sports) convention and trade show.
Schneider should know. The TEAMS staff learned lessons about contingency planning after 9/11 as they prepared for their show in Salt Lake City. Last year, they were headed to Fort Lauderdale a week after Hurricane Wilma. One lesson they took away from those events was the importance of communicating with attendees in a measured, yet honest fashion. “I never thought we’d have to help people make the decision to get on a plane,” says Schneider. TEAMS also tightened its own on-site security measures and trains staff in terrorism awareness to reassure attendees that the event is safe.
Of course, catastrophes on the scale of 9/11 are the exception, not the rule. Of the 10 most costly catastrophes in the U.S. between 1970 and 2005 (those that caused $25 million or more for insured property losses), eight were hurricanes, one an earthquake and one the terrorist attacks of 2001, according to the Insurance Information Institute of New York. Between 1985 and 2004, tropical storms and tornadoes accounted for 65 percent of U.S. catastrophic losses. All other causes—including terrorism, blizzards, earthquakes, fires, civil disorders and power disruptions—accounted for the remaining 35 percent.
Trying to address each of these macro scenarios while concentrating on the content of the meeting might overwhelm a planner. Former CIA operative Peter Earnest—now the executive director of the International Spy Museum in Washington, D.C.—agrees that planners should simply work to enhance their awareness of potential problems, create basic contingency plans and train staff members to watch out for trouble. “Everybody has a security responsibility,” Earnest says.
To get creative Plan B juices flowing, following are ideas from planners and other experts about how you can enhance contingency planning, along with tips for getting started.
CHOOSING THE DESTINATION
Keeping up with the daily news will increase awareness of potential problem spots. It can lead to tough but very prudent decisions to move or cancel. Tim Brown, principal of Meeting Sites Resource in Newport Beach, Calif., cites the wisdom of one client who pulled out of Istanbul due to political unrest and another who pulled out of the Caribbean as a result of Hurricane Katrina.
But further, to mitigate risk, ask cities under consideration what kind of contingency plans are in place for visitors. Some destinations have county or statewide organizations that connect law enforcement and emergency services with the business community and conduct regular disaster drills. Knowing about such organizations might reassure potential attendees.
For instance, in tsunami-prone Hawaii, the World Tsunami Headquarters has developed a comprehensive system that delineates evacuation zones. Each hotel has a specific plan for guests, including emergency transportation routes. The statewide plan is broken out by island; hotels disseminate the information to visitors.
When an earthquake struck the Big Island last October, Nathalie Picard of wireless technology company CSR plc in Richardson, Texas worried she might have to cancel an upcoming meeting for 175 people. But the biggest issue she faced from attendees coming from Asia was the fear of a subsequent tsunami. CSR was able to quell those fears and stage the meeting, with a lot of help from the group’s host hotel, the Fairmont Orchid.
“More planners clearly are asking for emergency procedures,” says Michael Murray, a vice president at the Hawaii Visitors & Convention Bureau. The plan reassures them that Hawaii has their best interests in mind, he says.
Such detailed safety, security and disaster plans also can be a marketing tool. In 2004, the Southern California Tourism Safety & Security Association (a joint effort of the Anaheim/Orange County Visitor & Convention Bureau and the Anaheim Police Department) commissioned a survey of 2,300 leisure and business visitors about security matters. On a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being most important, 39 percent of business and convention travelers ranked safety and security a 10 as a factor in deciding whether or not to attend a convention.
As a result, the VCB takes police and security teams along on site inspections with meeting planners. Convention Center General Manager David Meeks says his staff reviews safety matters with almost every group that comes to the center. Longtime Convention Center users sometimes take part in drills. In the long run, that becomes a selling tool that can help planners drive attendance and demonstrate to their bosses or clients that they’ve addressed safety issues.
CHOOSING THE PROPERTY
There are myriad things you can ask a hotel about its security. An easy starting point is to look for common security measures like cameras in public areas, car inspections at vehicle parking lots and soft barriers (like a row of planters) at entry points. Some hotel companies—Hilton and Wyndham among them—readily work with planners to point out security features, conduct back-of-house tours and bring security into pre-convention or site inspection meetings. Ask if the hotel you’re considering does that. If you have VIP guests or speakers, make sure to walk through plans concerning their arrival and departure. Eisenstodt also asks hotels to remind guests to look at the safety features listed in guest rooms.
But not every hotel will readily share its emergency plan—and meeting planners may not know how to evaluate those plans when they do see them. A new option offered by Wilmington, Del.-based SafePlace Corp. offers a possible solution to the dilemma. Launched in January, the SafeMeetings plan invites meeting planners to nominate hotels under consideration for events to be certified by SafePlace. Those accepting may ultimately earn a two-year accreditation after demonstrating compliance with best practices in hospitality safety.
SafePlace also is developing a Web-based risk assessment tool for meeting planners to help them assess hotels (interested planners can e-mail meetings@safeplace.com). “We have the expertise to evaluate (the hotels); ideally we want to make SafePlace certification the industry standard,” says director of project development and promotion Pamela Hague. For a checklist of other questions to ask hotels, see sidebar, opposite.)
EVENT SECURITY
Of course you want to keep your attendees, staff and presenters safe during your event. Keeping proprietary information safe is another concern. Some simple precautions might do the trick. The TEAMS conference requires photo ID before handing out badges to registrants. Have checkpoints at various entryways and meeting rooms and ask staff to be active in policing proper use of credentials.
For star-studded or major sports events that might be a terrorist target, systems like the one used by Irvine, Calif.-based Secured Entry combine screening with marketing. The digital weapons detector looks like the familiar doorway-style screening used at airports. But its technology enables screeners to pinpoint where weapons may be present without onerous wand searches. Organizers
or sponsors have the option to run promotions across the top of the unit for attendees to see while they wait to enter, turning the cost of the screening units into a potential revenue-generator.
To keep proprietary information secure, you might take a page from a telecom convention held in Denver last summer. The group’s contract kept all non-participants out of the convention center during their stay. Some-times corporate groups disallow the use of wireless devices on site to minimize the risk of cyber theft. Surprisingly few meetings and conventions include emergency procedures for the facility in their opening sessions or attendee packets. That’s possibly the most important thing to know. Bob Mellinger, president of business continuity consulting firm Attainium Corp. in Virginia, says planners should look for signage pointing to evacuation routes and ask the facility if their staff would be on hand to guide attendees if they need to leave the building.
Some planners advocate sharing emergency plans with attendees and trade show exhibitors; others fear scaring them. “The single toughest decision to make is what to tell people,” Mellinger says.
If you need to get attendees out of town as well as out of the facility—and do it fast—planners have the option to contract with companies like Private Jet Services Group of New Hampshire. PJSG’s contingency program provides planners with airlift options for up to 1,500 people at no cost until the service is used. When it’s needed, clients can make one phone call to send appropriate aircraft on the way.
INSURANCE
From an insurer’s perspective, the biggest risks to meetings and conventions are hurricanes, floods, oil spills, terrorism, blackouts and cyber theft, according to Tom Kornelis of Wells Fargo Insurance Services, who spoke at the recent IAEM (International Association for Exhibition Management) convention. But corporate America doesn’t always agree. “Senior management of corporate America thinks computer-based risks are No. 1,” Kornelis says.
Those risks—along with global pandemics like avian flu—are emerging areas for the insurance industry where coverage isn’t yet standardized. On the other hand, some restrictions on coverage along the Gulf Coast put in place after Katrina have now been lifted by companies like AON Association Services, which offers event-cancellation insurance under the name “Showstoppers.”
Policies like Showstoppers are designed for event organizers and typically cover losses the facility won’t cover, such as lost materials, transportation costs or the cost of refunding registration and exhibitor fees. “That could make or break an association,” says AON’s Eileen Hoffman.
Coverage also can be had for reduced attendance resulting from bad weather, earthquakes, fires or labor strife. AON recently added an option for some communicable disease coverage, subject to underwriter approval.
Planners who believe event-cancellation insurance is cost prohibitive needn’t worry, as some rates have softened during the past few years. John Hamby, entertainment practice leader for insurance provider Marsh Inc. in Los Angeles, adds that planners can make insurance more cost-effective by increasing their deductible or negotiating extra assumption of risk in the venue contract.
Some insurers will look at the experience of the meeting planner and/or the track record of the venue where the event will be held when assessing risk. “(Coverage for) conventions during hurricane season in hurricane-prone geographic areas will be more costly,” Hamby says.
GETTING THE BUDGET
Meeting planners wanting to be prepared need to convince their CFOs or clients that the cost of contingency plans is worth it—not always an easy task. But some efforts don’t take a lot of dollars to implement. It doesn’t cost money to ask some trusted attendees to be an extra set of eyes and ears and let you know if something seems out of line. It also doesn’t cost a lot to know who’s in charge and the chain of command should an emergency occur.
And if the executive with the purse strings still balks? “Ask (that person) to figure out the cost if something happens—in reputation, in possible lawsuit, or in insurance rates,” Eisenstodt says. Being armed with facts doesn’t hurt, either. Show the person in charge what has happened in other places or what characteristics the meeting or attendees have that demand extra security. “People can sell the idea,” she says.
START YOUR PLAN B NOW
There may come a time when corporate and association executives will expect meeting planners to address these issues as part of their job. Attain-ium’s Mellinger suggest that planners turn to professional help to create an initial business continuity plan and then reuse it with periodic updates. That helps mitigate the cost of developing the plan in the first place. Remember, no one can ever think of every possible thing that might go wrong. It’s understanding that something may go wrong one day that’s important.
“All you can do is gather information and make intelligent decisions based on a calculated risk,” Meeting Sites Resource’s Brown says. “Being prepared is what must happen in this day and age.”
Sandi Cain is a freelance journalist who has covered the meetings, hospitality and tourism industries in Orange County since 1997 for the Orange County Business Journal and other trade publications. She is a resident of Laguna Beach, Calif.
