Crisis Policy Work

Defining a crisis for a standing department policy is no small effort. The common language of FEMA/ICS and the life-safety side of critical incidents does not translate well in athletics. Personally, I see a lot of people intimidated by saying the reality out loud, and with the federal mandate for clear language, there's no euphemistic terms allowed. Followers know this was my 2009 CoSIDA Convention topic, and a regular item in this space for years.

Several weeks ago, we managed to work out what defined a crisis (since there was a dislike for the more common term in the business of "critical incident") was:

A situation that threatens to dramatically affect the lives or well-being of student-athletes or staff, significantly damage the property or operations of the athletic department, or may negatively impact the events, reputation or normal activities of the athletic department.

I'm pleased with it because the goal should be to create a policy and operational standards that can be plugged into any "crisis" -- from a tornado to a player suspension, from a life-safety incident at a practice to a major policy announcement, from a water main break that floods the stadium to a national championship celebration parade. They are all crisis -- and not all crisis are negative. Think about planning for success: what will you do if your team wins it all?

So the next step becomes separating out response levels. Most of the plans out there look at three levels; I'm going to advocate understanding that there really are four. From draft language -- and yes I'm looking for feedback here:

A routine event that has the potential to disrupt daily operations, negatively impact the department or require the communication of information internally or externally defines the difference between day-to-day events and an incident that would invoke the policy. This is an administrative decision unless the incident involves health and welfare of a student-athlete, member of the department or patron of an event.

Routine events are level zero within the critical event policy. Level one events are incidents which are limited in scope - both in time frame to resolve and overall impact on the department. Level two events are emergencies which last longer than a day in their impact on the entirety of the athletic department. Level three events are catastrophic, with impacts that are long lasting or permanent, reaching beyond the scope of the athletic department into the university and overall community as a whole.

What is your take on the "level zero" concept?