In just a few short weeks the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) summit will be descending upon the city of Chicago. Whether your business has customers, employees, suppliers or property in the Windy City, the summit could impact your operations.

Businesses face a host of risks like office occupation and raids; denial of access to places of business; employee and customer injury; and physical-property damage.

Zurich has released a whitepaper, now available on Twitter @ZurichNAnews, to help businesses craft a NATO-risk action plan that addresses advance planning as well as organizational performance once a disturbance begins. Your plan should address everything from communications to emergency evacuations to necessary staffing levels.

Lessons gleaned from this whitepaper can be applied by risk managers with operations in any city facing a major event.

The following goals should be at the center of any emergency plan:

Employee and customer safety should be your first priority. Employees are a company's most valuable asset. Evaluate staffing needs and promote safety. Constant communication, accommodating employees and visitors, and securing the property where your business resides will help keep your people at the forefront of your plan.
Maintain business continuity. Businesses should revisit their business-continuity plans to ensure that contingencies exist for: not being able to freely access their place of business; key staff being unable to get to work; information lost because of power outage or if a network goes down; suppliers unable to deliver.
Have immediate access to your repair and claims contacts. Verify coverage, limits, conditions and deductibles. Be prepared to act immediately to repair any physical-property damage to prevent additional loss.
Have one person monitor social networks. Social networks such as Twitter and Facebook can be important sources for up-to-date information on whether trouble's brewing—and where. Designating one person to this task will help create a clear communication channel.

Special Reports /

What Risk Managers Can Learn from NATO Summit Preparation Tactics

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