MountainScenarios

Tag: disaster recovery plan

The EV Hurricane Disaster: a 1-sided scenario, Part 1

An unsigned, undated, email came circulating the web presenting a horror story about EVs: Everyone has electric cars, and they are all trying to flee the peninsula (let’s say South Florida) as a hurricane approaches. Cars are stuck in traffic with no place to go, and no place the recharge. Can’t run radios and air conditioning because that uses precious batteries. Kids and elderly suffering in sweltering heat.

The obvious conclusion: we all need to stick with huge gas-guzzling SUVs and avoid moving into the future.

PREDICT a Pandemic: First Kill those Pesty Scientists

Rough Road Ahead

Oh My God!

Trumps administration completely stopped the PREDICT program that did USAID training and response world-wide for pandemics.  Since the Bird Flu of 2005 (H5N1), the US presidents (Bush II and Obama) have moved toward building a program to identify potential pandemics and to help countries (including the USA) deal with such an eventuality. Of course, the PREDICT program got to deal with several pandemic-type events including SARS, MERS, Ebola and even Zika (mosquito). The idea, which apparently worked very well, is to fight a pandemic where it originates in other countries, so that you don’t have to fight it here in the USA. Of course, the train-the-trainer program would be developed and applied here in the USA.

Pandemic Scenario in Trump Transition Team, Days before Office

Okay!. So the Obama administration left the incoming Trump administration several scenarios for them to think about. No evidence as to what happened to the final report. But apparently, it showed everything that we have seen since November in China, and the first outbreaks outside of China. The result was a world-wide pandemic. Overwhelming the US with supply shortages and patent overflows. What happened to the final report? The early warning signposts? The disaster (recovery) plans?

We did a blog post about the military planning scenarios that would have realized a pandemic as an act of war… Or, even if it wasn’t caused by an act of war, the resulting story line would be similar. And, of course, if the pandemic started elsewhere, there would signals and signposts, in the jargon of Shell related to early warning signs in scenario planning.

A major country should be doing military scenario planning for several topics. None is quite as huge and integrated as climate change. Look at this report produced by The National Security, Military, And Intelligence Panel on Climate Change (NSMIP, February 2020), A Security Threat Assessment of Global Climate Change: How Likely Warming Scenarios Indicate a Catastrophic Security Future. It doesn’t seem possible that the US would not have a plan like this for a pandemic? It also doesn’t seem possible that the US would not have multiple plans for economic recession, no matter the cause. Since we missed the boat on the pandemic, hopefully we didn’t miss planning for a recession… However, this recession is like none we have ever had before. Kind of like turning the switch off on most of the economy for a while. (How long is a “while” is a $4T question?)

Kiaser Health News did a composite of highlights from several articles about the Trump transition team and how badly they apparently failed in the Pandemic exercise: How A Crisis Simulation Run Before Trump’s Inauguration By Obama’s Team Eerily Mirrors Current Outbreak!

November in China. By December, the military and health official had to know that expansion into a global pandemic was was not only possible, but likely. In Florida, when we see a Hurricane coming, we dust off all of our contingency plans for the businesses and start buying toilet paper and canned goods. We make sure that we have lots of jugs to fill with water if needed (no need to buy water, by the way).

Did the military and health officials simply forget to mention these things up the chain of command, or — apparently more likely — did the higher-up-the-chain-of-command not listen? What the hell happened to the results of the simulation? Did it take the path of anything and everything that Obama did/mentioned/signed/said, flushed down the toilet?

Using Delphi Method for planning… including Scenario Planning and Horizon Plans.

This site discusses and tracks the use of Delphi-type methods in doing all kinds of research: academic, theoretical and real-world. Businesses can use the Delphi method to identify key issues, develop scenario plans and/or do horizon planning.

Strategic Business Planning that use similar methods as those used by Delphi Method. A strategic planning workshop for strat plan development uses a modified SWOT planning situational analysis method, for example. But the Delphi Method works best for horizon planning, future new product planning and scenario planning. We like to integrate disaster recovery planning (business continuity planning) into the scenario planning process.

Strategic Planning company (Hall, Hinkelman and associates) have done research and publishing on scenario planning and Delphi Method research.

Find these articles/books at:

  • SBPs Storefront at LuLu Press: LuLu.com/spotlight/SBPlan (Chapter 8 of the Guide 2.0 as well as the Economic Development Plan.)
  • Refractive Thinker(r) RefractiveThinker.com (Look for articles/chapters on Delphi research including the Delphi Primer.)

ScenarioPlanningTimeline

We like to look for that future deflection point were it would be clear to everyone, including the dog, “Toto, I’ve a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.”

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