10 Day Tune Up for H1N1 – Day 10: Team Briefing

Today is the final day in my 10 Day Tune Up for H1N1. Let’s look at how to bring your team together around this mission critical initiative.

photo credit: acme401

A Really Big To-Do List

Over the past ten days, I have focuses on actions you should take to prepare for the fall influenza season as well as interruptions to your organization that might arise from H1N1 influenza. By now you probably have a long list of things to do in order to prepare. It is here where many people suffer from mission paralysis. They have so much to accomplish, they freeze. What do you do first?

What is a Top Priority?

Miles Nadal, the Chairman and CEO of MDC Partners, has a fascinating filter for determining whether or not a priority is a real top priority.

If a priority is not Mission Critical and Time Sensitive, it’s not a Top Priority.

Note the two conditions that a task must satisfy to become a Top Priority.

• Mission Critical events are activities whose failure or disruption in normal business hours will result in the failure of business operations.
• Time Sensitive events, as the term implies, are activities whose failure to complete within a specified time frame will result in the failure of business operations.

The combination of the two, according to Nadal, is the lens to establish your Top Priority.

Top Priorities for H1N1 Framework

No two organizations are identical. As a result, there is no one-size-fits-all approach to managing your H1N1 influenza plan. Only your organization can establish what you plan to do. The question now becomes one of selecting the priority.

• Do you roll out an internal communications channel for employees and key stakeholders?
• Should employee benefit plans offer circumstantial options related to social distancing, extended absenteeism, or care for ill family members?
• How will your organization manage suppliers and sub-contractors?

There are many other mission critical questions you could also ask. If these issues face a time constraint as well, then you must look at the possibility of that question as a top priority. Once you determine your Top Priority, it is time to set the ball into motion and address that priority.

Today’s To-Do: Have a Team Briefing

Regardless of what Top Priority you establish for your plan this fall, it is paramount that you communicate your objectives to three groups.

1. Senior Management to whom you report
2. Employees to whom the policies affect
3. Your team to whom the responsibility will rest to achieve the objectives

Today’s To-Do is a Team Briefing. You should review important information such as an overview of the CDC’s H1N1 policy guidelines, your organization’s expectations and business framework, and what you have determined to be your Top Priority in addressing seasonal and H1N1 influenza.

Depending on the size of your team, and the nature of their normal work, it might serve all parties that your meeting take place off-site in order to bring focused attention to the work.

Here are other articles I have written on this topic:

• Resources to Help You Plan for H1N1 Flu
• Is Your Business Continuity Plan Ready for H1N1 Flu?
• Peter Weill: IT Savvy Can Be a Strategic Asset
• Catechetical Plan
• New Campaign for Will County Health Department
• The Art of Cleaning Up a Mess
• 10 Day Tune Up for H1N1 – Day 8: Business Continuity
• 10 Day Tune Up for H1N1 – Day 7: Social Media Checklist
• 10 Day Tune Up for H1N1 – Day 6: Reporters’ Notebook
• 10 Day Tune Up for H1N1 – Day 5: Test Your Call Tree