To be honest crisis management is something that we don’t often come into contact with in a formal sense. From a business perspective, there is always one ticking over in the background and pending the type of business the frequency of its activation is determined. Applying this to home life, is more than a financial contingency plan which I find most common – the suggested saving of three months wages for the just in case – for more info read The Barefoot Investor for families by Scott Pape. A crisis management plan is not so much a plan as a process that can be divided into three sections pre – crisis, crisis response and post crisis.
By building this into your family blueprint, as a family you will be prepared to an extent for a crisis, emergency or disaster. The idea behind having this type of plan, even briefly mapped out is to reduce the fear involved and enable the navigation of it to be the focus.
To lay it all out on the table crisis, disaster and emergency are defined as:
A crisis is a time of intense difficulty or danger.
dictionary.com
An emergency is a serious, unexpected, and often dangerous situation requiring immediate action.
dictionary.com
A disaster is a sudden accident or a natural catastrophe that causes great damage or loss of life.
dictionary.com
As you can see, it is a sliding scale of impact on your family and community. None are ideal, but in life these types of situations are not an ‘if’ but ‘ when’ scenario. No one is immune from unkind situations. Here at Homes of Victory we are going to give you some framework to create a crisis management plan to enable you to navigate these seasons in life and hopefully feel more equipped.
Pre-crisis plan
First up, we have the pre-crisis plan. The following series of questions will assist you in creating a list of actions regarding the contents of your family a pre-crisis plan. We have included the basics of what we believe will contribute effectively to your family blueprint. You and your family may have other aspects to add to this part of the plan.
Red Cross have a great online plan that lists everything you need to consider in an emergency or disaster type situation for example bushfires and floods.
When it comes to other life situations such as a crisis like an injury or illness with financial impacts there are other aspects to consider.
Documentation & medication information:
The Red Cross has a great plan for these details. This is a great template to use, for listing important documents and medication information.
Insurance:
- Do you have an up to date will?
- Is your superannuation up to date? Do you know how much insurance you have under your superannuation?
- Are all of your insurance policies up to date – home, car etc… ?
- Do you have all medicare and medical insurance up to date?
Financial:
- Do you have a savings plan in place, in case of loss of employment or unexpected expenses?
- Do you have other investments you could rely on?
- Do you have plans for multiple income streams?
Education:
- What tools are you going to use in your family life, to keep the crisis in perspective?
- Is there any education you need to invest in? e.g. first aid training, financial management, resilience, stress management etc…
- Are you aware of each other’s personality types? Keeping in mind we generally revert to this personality type under stress.
- Look for ways to be able to talk to your children about particular situations. Check out your local library for books that explain the experience.
- Do your children know how to phone emergency services? Relay their address?
Assistance:
- Do you have family you could call on for help when needed? Who is it, and do you need to have a conversation about it?
- Do you have a network of friends you could call on for help with the children.
By having a pre-crisis plan available to you and your family, it enables a level of organisation to be available for when life gets tricky.
Crisis Response
I feel this is one thing that is hard to define. For business it is all about making the crisis look minimal on the outside, while on the inside the business scrambles to mitigate the impact. From a family perspective this is far harder to do. I know for us, at time we do go quiet while dealing with issues that pop up in life, we take in a sense time out to deal, and then resurface. We are quite independent and over time have learnt to share what is happening in life and to accept support from friends and family. We tend to be the support rather than the supported. With all of that said, over time, we have also learnt to put measures in place, like what was discussed in the pre-crisis plan to enable us to navigate the obstacle as best we can. In the post – beware the layers, we share how we went through a hectic season of one crisis after another which brought us to our knees. One thing that pulled us through was our determination to continue to communicate, to continue building on the foundations of our relationship we had set, and deal the best with could with the layers of stress. These experiences have shown us how tough we are and we realised we are way stronger than we have ever given ourselves credit for. It also showed us, that in the end, we could be proud of how we managed it, as we did our best and that is all we can ask of ourselves. It wasn’t a fun experience, nor was it exciting. It was hard work, day in / day out – to stay afloat while staying grounded and keeping it all in perspective.
Take some time to think about situations that your family have faced. How did you pull through?
Were you proud of the way the crisis was handled?
What changes in your behaviour or thinking could you make to reduce the impact of it on your family?
Keep some space in your notebook, for the next crisis – take note of how you handled it and what improvements you’ve made. It does sound a little gloomy, but it is something to celebrate when you can see improvements on how you and your family deal with the not so nice situations in life.
Post crisis
When things settle down, and life carries on, it is important to look in retrospect at the situation or season and take some time to let the learnings sink in. When you are ready, take some time to look at:
What are your learnings?
How will what you’ve learnt equip you for the next crisis?
Who can you share your learnings with? Who will benefit from them?
What could you do to be more prepared next time?
We do acknowledge that we can never be prepared for everything in life but the more we learn as life goes on, the better we can deal with unexpected situations together.
Sometimes when you’re in a dark place you think you’ve been buried, but you’ve actually been planted.
Christine Caine – co-founder of A21
This absolutely represents what I believe should happen through our experiences in life – even the dark places, we can learn and grow, and something good will come out of it. It may take time, but eventually we will see the good.
Homes of Victory 