Planning for the Unexpected - Part 1

Before I get into the print quality and operations topics, the most important issue for a newspaper is the ability to produce the newspaper EVERYDAY. How rebust is your Continuity of Operations Plan (COOP) -- your action plan in the case of a disaster or event that affects your ability to produce your daily product.

All newspapers should have a plan for unexpected events that affect operations -- such as a natural disasters; earthquakes, hurricanes, etc., or site emergencies; fires, chemical spills or power outages, or equipment problems; broken parts, network or equipment operating problems. In all cases, a scaleable plan should be ready to continue critical functions during these events.

Not all disasters are forecasted. At NEXPO, a mid-west newspaper described the events and unexpected problems that occured from a simple scheduled maintenance to a main-line electrical switch. The plan was straight forward; power-down press control system and all building power on a Saturday morning, install new switch and restore power. However, during the power up process, errors caused the press systems to fail -- sending error codes for a variety of system components. The IT and Maintenance Crews worked throughout the day chasing error codes and calling vendors - the problem however was phone numbers for vendors were safely stored in a powered-off computer - unaccessable. Cell phone batteries were going dead after hours of use and communition with vendors was difficult on a Saturday. Eventually, systems were restarted and operation was restored.

A few Key Points Learned:
1. Have supplier support for all non-routine maintenance and repairs, no matter how straight forward it might seem, and get vendors involved in planning. In this case, powering off the press and restarting required a systematic restarting procedure - which could have been identified by the OEM, had they been involved in planning.
2. Have printed and accessable copies of SOP's, an established Continuity of Operations Plan, Key contacts, support for employees and their families, and a timeline to empliment the plan.
3. Have systematic restart procedures for equipment and systems.
4. Have a emergency kit with master keys, extra batteries, contacts and business operations plans to transfer critical operations and production to alternate sites.
5. Have a plan for employees to communicate with family and cover non-work committments - picking kids up from school or letting the dog out.
6. Test the Plan: run simulations to test your COOP and make sure your operation is ready to respond to maintain operations and maintain critical business functions.