Crisis preparedness in government departments in Australia

Abstract

A survey of Australian government communicators (n = 45) at a 2008 conference on crisis preparedness and management has shown that more than 80% of departments had a crisis management plan and that 90% of these plans were tested at least once a year. Almost 70% of those surveyed were ‘very confident’ or ‘somewhat confident’ in their crisis management plans, even though 44% felt that the level of senior management support for crisis planning was not sufficient. The research supported previous US research (Cloudman & Hallahan, 2006) that showed that the level of crisis preparedness (measured by the presence of crisis management and business continuity plans, frequency of drills based on the plans, the level of incorporation of disaster into the plans, frequency of plan review and confidence with crisis management planning) was related to the size of the organisation and the size of its communication function. The size of the organization also seemed to be a predictor of confidence in crisis planning and preparedness, with 13 of the 19 (68.4%) respondents that reported that they were ‘very confident’ or ‘somewhat confident’ in their crisis preparations coming from organizations larger than 500 employees.