Contingency Plan: In Business
Character of contingency plan
Question of what else can we do about it in order to stay on track in managing business and organization.
Once we have started the race, we must finish it. When organization makes a commitment, it must honor its promise to deliver on their commitment. Contingency planning is about ensuring the course of business while the heart of organization continues to beat to its own rhythm.
It shouldn’t be looked at as a life support system in the event of emergency. It shouldn’t be considered a compensation behavior for what’s lost or what couldn’t be maintained supposedly at its normal state either.
It is an answer to the question of how we are going to get there in case first idea hadn’t worked, second one didn’t work out, and third one was not working and so forth. It is the way of keeping our options open to reason with a realistic expectation that will produce what organization promised to deliver.
It is about ability to utilize all available mode of transportation to take us to where we set out to go; planes, ships, rails, cars, buses, bikes, even on foot if we need to. It allows us to be flexible in our approach, to keep our perspective in the right place away from self-interest that often blinds the eyes of organization, and to be accountable. It affords us a breathing space to reason what we do and how we do and shapes the moves we can make.
Minimum two contingency plans
Contingency plan is, therefore, neither a secondary plan nor a mere supportive measure. It must have its own strength to move forward to become a primary plan enabling the capacity to change the course of action without change of strategy.
Apart from the primary plan of each functional management aspect in the organization, there must be at least minimum two sets of alternative contingency plan measure need to be put in place that fall into the same categorical strategic guidelines.
In other words, contingency plan must be drawn up separate from primary plan of each business function, such as management plan, financial plan, marketing plan, sales plan, production plan, procurement plan, human resources plan, customer relationship management plan, even risk management plan, and etc.
So each departmental function will thus have a three plan package – the primary plan and two contingency plans- under the same initiatives and purpose of strategic direction. Further, business plan and strategy of the organization should definitely have contingency plan of their own. This is a crucial step in organization operation set-up and management.
Viability of contingency plan
In order to check the operative condition of contingency plan drawn up, we are going to need to diagnose whether they are in poor health or in good health by following diagnostic tool through regular check-ups.
Reality must be served in the best interest of realty that matters to hearts and minds of those who live their lives in a real world. Contingency plan is about admitting that, no matter how ideal we want to be, there is a reality that cannot be ignored. Otherwise it will turn out to be one of those documents that rings hollow in the face of hard reality.
A few things on functional capacity check list that must not be missed.
- Dead or alive, useless or not - Getting up to speed with reality?
- Response time in real time – Deployable and executable at a moment’s notice?
- Loose end - Riding out the devil in the details.
- Back to back transferable – As good as a primary plan?
Working out contingency measure
How can we gather information and establish a baseline to draw up a practical, useful, up to date contingency plan at the ready, which is streamlined to serve the purpose of keeping the organization on track for an optimized business operation?
Contingency plan will need to be drawn up from the recipient’s perspective, your customer and your client, not from yours as a provider.
If in doubt, ask these basic 3 questions;
- What do we need a contingency plan for?
- Who is going to be the recipients of the contingency plan when it’s executed?
- What are they going to expect to receive from it?
Answers are given already in the above Character of Contingency Plan. It’s now a matter of configuring them to organization or business needs and functions on a practical term.
Recommend the following 3 points be taken into account in drafting contingency plan. This approach helps raise understanding of the business, not just on three dimensional perspectives, but to a holographic dimensional viewing position.
Backtracking
– Find out how your customer will get your product or service, and what they are going to do with it, how they are going to do with it, and etc? There are many questions to be asked in order to understand the nature of business or project in a realistic term. (I am thinking along the line of resources industry, industrial manufacturing, and financial service as I am writing this.)
– Trace their way through to you by backtracking, including governance and regulatory issues. From this exercise, you will get to know the every single post your customer is going to pass to pick your product or service. The road on the way is literally littered with information that you just cannot miss, however irrelevant it may seem to appear at first glance.
Peaceful time engagement
– The best time and opportunity to work on contingency plan is when things are going well for you and your customers, and everyone is relatively happy with how things are, in other words boring time is the best time.
– When things are going nice and smooth, actively engage with customers. Call on them during peaceful time. See their operation. You can read a lot about your competitors and market place movement. You will be able to see what keeps customer happy during this time. That’s the element you are going to provide when contingency plan gets activated.
Test drive
– In order to put a truly workable contingency plan in place, you are going to need to turn and change your perspective 180 degree. That is, you are going to walk a mile in your customer’s shoes literally. It is not about gesture of sympathy based understanding we hear too often. It is about holding a sharp focused realistic grip on the state of reality.
– Role playing is not good enough. Position shifting must occur in real time mentally and emotionally, which means you must serve from your customer’s end. Seeing things and working out them from customers view point. Not only should you know what’s like to lead, you should also know what’s like to be led. Leave the hindsight behind, take the foresight along with you.
Based on that insight, you are then going to come up with a particular platform to combine and unite functions and needs of both sides, so the twain shall meet, not remain opposite an opposite, ensuring the two arrive where they are going to go successfully.
10/2478
(C) Copy right- Sabina Kim. Transformativemanagement.com All rights reserved.
