In the wake of Healthscope — a crisis planning ethos

Not all healthcare crises feature rows of banked ambulances, chaotic emergency rooms or equipment shortages. Many, such as Healthscope’s recent fall, take place in the corridors of corporate power or in big boardrooms where risks and threats remain private and hidden — until they become embarrassingly public. In the aftermath of Healthscope’s collapse into administration, a crisis simulation and training specialist sets out an ‘audit, educate, simulate’ crisis planning ethos.

Healthscope’s fall offers salutary lessons about the risks swirling around this vital sector, including increases in chronic diseases, spiralling costs, and problems relating to materials sourcing, remuneration and skills availability. There are pressing concerns for the country’s B2B healthcare supply chain, where many vulnerabilities lurk. The interdependent ecosystem of B2B health care — from pharmaceutical products to device suppliers and essential IT infrastructure — is a virtual Jenga tower. When one block is removed, the knock-on effects can be devastating.

This systemic interdependence means every healthcare organisation needs to reconsider and refresh its crisis-prevention plans — from the risk matrix to its business continuity plans — as well as its issue and incident response strategies. It’s not enough for any healthcare brand to insist its product or service alone couldn’t cause damage, and fail to do any issues or crisis mitigation work. When any item is a critical cog in a larger wheel, there’s scope for both liability or litigation should that item not be available — or perform — when it’s needed most.

Healthcare enterprises must develop, rehearse and learn those plans, processes, roles and responsibilities, which their staff need to effectively triage, respond to and overcome any presenting risks. So how might a healthcare entity go about getting risk and crisis ready?

The PPRR model: a blueprint for crisis preparation

A durable and usable framework for issues management is the PPRR model: Prevention, Preparedness, Response and Recovery. Think of it as a strategic blueprint for survival; a cyclical ethos asserting that issues and risk management isn’t a one-off event, but a continuous process that helps to mitigate crises.

Prevention

Prevention is about spotting trouble before it starts. It’s about scanning your environment for possible threats; whether it’s a single point of failure in your own premises or supply chain, or a vulnerability within the wider industry. It might even be changes within your contractual or financial structures.

Preparedness

Preparedness is about making sure you’re ready for the worst; formulating plans and training teams with realistic threat scenarios and building robust contingencies.

Response

Response refers to the sound decisions and appropriate actions that will mitigate damage and protect stakeholder impact. Responses, generally, should be selfless rather than selfish.

Recovery

Recovery mode is when executives and entities can reflect on how to rebuild with even more resilience than before. What were the key learnings? What were the chinks in our armour? How can we help or best support our people and processes?

The crisis diagnostic: identifying weak spots

An organisation-wide Crisis Diagnostic (aka, a crisis audit) benchmarks your plans and your people against established practice standards. External experts can bring an independent and dispassionate review of flaws or shortcomings that you may have become blind to. Some simulation providers now offer templated questionnaires that allow companies to checklist their capabilities — and instantly compare them to mandated practices for effective risk mitigation or crisis response.

Crisis simulations: learning by doing

A good plan isn’t that good if it’s not known, tried or tested. Obviously, you don’t want to wait for a real disaster to emerge to metaphorically hold your plans and people to the fire; a realistic crisis simulation can recreate the pressures to be faced when a crisis incident occurs.

How would your team react? Would sound decisions be made? Could communication messages be crafted quickly? Crisis simulators replicate the real-time decision-making challenges that will occur. And when employees learn by doing — by interactive learning — core learnings they need are better retained.

Audit, educate, simulate

The Australian healthcare sector is no stranger to crises; from cyber hacks to employee abuse on social media, to chronic underfunding to suspicious overbilling. Clearly, your organisation cannot leave crisis or risk management to chance. The time to audit, educate and simulate for crises is not ‘another day’ — it’s right now. As the Healthscope furore demonstrates, the community, your customers and your peers demand it.

*Gerry McCusker is Managing Director of The Drill.

Top image credit: iStock.com/sturti