Impact Analysis

Immediate Activation of Crisis Management Plan

When the blackout occurred at approximately 4:10 P.M. on August 14, the company immediately activated its incident management/crisis management protocols, which brought together representatives from all major lines of business and senior executives using cellular phones and personal message devices that were not impacted by the power outage.

They immediately set to work performing an impact analysis of what they knew about the situation and which activities, based on the known assessment, could be implemented. The team focused on which facilities were impacted, whether operations within those facilities were operational, and which workload activities could be transferred to locations in other parts of the country that were unaffected by the blackout.

Not only did they assess the impact on the nonoperational business units but also the impact on those other facilities taking on the additional workload, as these areas would need to extend business hours and ensure only critical functions were the focus.

This analysis was performed for all areas impacted by the blackout and for those that had the potential of receiving diverted phone calls, e-mails, and other core business functions that would be above their normal level of operational activity. This was performed in conjunction with technology team employees located at the other sites, as they would need to initiate many of the redirection activities because those located at the impacted sites no longer had the ability to do so.

Once the impacts were determined and the appropriate response implemented, an assessment was performed as to the impacts upon external sources. This means that they needed to discover if there was any impact to their clients and partners because the corporation was not available, as many partners had specific timelines—and deadlines—for electronic files to be submitted. In many instances, a missed deadline resulted in a financial penalty, as the corporation's unavailability impacted millions of Canadians, most notably throughout the financial systems of the country.

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