BCI Emergency Communications Report 2020: Organizations Can Implement Emergency Communications Plans Quicker and More Effectively Thanks to Technological Innovation, Training and Exercising of Plans

CAVERSHAM, England, Jan. 23, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- The Business Continuity Institute (BCI), in partnership with F24, has released the 5^th edition of the BCI Emergency Communications Report. This annual publication provides insight into how organizations communicate in an emergency, the key communication challenges organizations face and how technology is helping to assist in communications processes.

State of the art technology enables faster communications

This year's report found an increase in organizations using emergency notification and/or crisis management tools - 67% compared to 59.3% in 2019. This rise in popularity of using specialist emergency notification and crisis management tools/software suggests many of the organizations have decided to switch to specialist tools rather than rely on the free options available in the market. The companies using a software/tool are significantly faster in communications than those without.

The report also found that an increasing number of organizations prefer using software-as-a-service (SaaS) solutions rather than on-premise software solutions. Nearly two-thirds of organizations (65.9%) are electing to use a SaaS solution, whilst under a fifth (19.5%) are using on-premise installed software. A SaaS solution can help to deliver a seamless emergency communications solution across multiple devices and can also help surpass the problem of adopting a new solution on legacy systems, an issue highlighted as a barrier to adoption by over half (51.2%) of respondents in the BCI 2019 Disruptive Technologies Report.

Lack of budget is the most cited reason for not employing an emergency communications tool, with over a third (36.4%) reporting they had no budget was defined for emergency communications tools or software. Just under a fifth of respondents (19.1%) felt that their organization was too small for such a tool to be adopted.  

In terms of activation timing for emergency communications plans, the report found out that companies are faster than last year: Under a third of respondents confirmed that they can activate their plan within five minutes, compared to a fifth in 2019. Furthermore, a small but significant minority (1.6%) claimed activation took zero time due to an automated response based on an IT event/rule. Only 1% of organizations reported that it took over 12 hours to activate their emergency communications plan, down from 2.4% in 2019.

Rachael Elliott, Head of Thought Leadership at the BCI, on this year's report:

"Rarely in our research do we witness such a tangible improvement year-on-year. It is therefore extremely encouraging to see that investment in new technologies coupled with an increased dedication to training and exercising has resulted in improvements in both the effectiveness of response and the time it takes for plans to be activated. Once again, however, it is human failure that is the cause for plans to fail, and we would encourage organizations to continue to ensure that contact details are kept up-to-date and keep up the renewed vigour we are seeing in terms of rehearsing and exercising."

Christian Götz, founder and Executive Board member at F24 AG and responsible for Sales, Marketing & PR, HR and Customer Service, on this years report:

"I remain convinced that professionals working together with sound, properly implemented technology can handle critical situations far better than without it. I am pleased to see that once again more companies than previously (67%) use a software or tool and thereby are not only significantly faster than those without, but also profit from many additional benefits. The adaption of technology plays a crucial role in order to minimize the consequences of emergency and crisis situations ? and this is the overall target we are working on."

An extended version of the press release can be found at www.f24.com/en/media/.

Press contact F24: 
F24 AG
Dr. Stefanie Hauer
Corporate Communications
+49-89-2323 638-0
[email protected]