Take care of your heroes

What is your plan to take care of those that take care of your crises? Some crises take longer or have a harder toll than you expect. But if you burn out your team along the way, you may not get the recovery that you’re hoping for.  Taking some lessons from First Responders for this Two Minute Mondays episode, let’s look at how we support those that assure our Disaster Recovery, Business Continuity, and Cyber Resilience.

video transcript

When each of my sons first began their first responder careers, one of my concerns was that they would be thrust into some grave and often disturbing situations.

• As an EMT, one sees not only the fragility of life where every second matters, but also the unfortunate realities the many families face under the constant stress of an ailing loved one, which can be both heartbreaking and infuriating.
• As a police officer, one sees the evils and toxicity that pervade every corner of our neighborhoods, with the conflicting mindsets of “try to help everyone” but “assume danger and ensure you get home safe”.

Most of us don’t have jobs like that. In roles like those, it’s common for their organizations to be proactively mindful of ensuring support systems, mental health, coaching and mentoring, and opportunities to diffuse.

And while I would never suggest that IT or resilience roles have near that kind of stress, there are lessons to be learned and questions to be asked on ”How well are we taking care of our resilience professionals?”, so that when our organization does face a major crisis — that they are personally resilient — so that the organization can be operationally resilient.

Sometimes that means arranging extra child care or sending help to the homes to bail water out of their living rooms, because the parent that would be doing that is removing ransomware from your servers or recovering systems after a flood. Also don’t underestimate the power of fresh coffee, real food that doesn’t always come wrapped in paper, and not just some temporary bedding but also the encouragement to take a rest, go for a walk, or find balance even in the middle of the fray.

Some business crises last longer than you think. If you burn out your team along the way, you may not get the recovery that you’re hoping for. And even after the crisis is over, be thinking about what do those resilience responders need before they can go back to normal – on the job and also at home.

Again, IT and resilience professionals won’t see the same kinds of trauma as first responders, but whenever you ask anyone to be heroic … make sure your plan already includes how to take care of your heroes.

See you next Monday