Independent Vendor-neutral Northern California
PREPARE

Emergency and incident planning.

Emergency and incident planning defines who does what, in what order, when something goes wrong at your facility. It covers the physical security dimension of response: lockdown and controlled egress, communication, access for responders, assembly and accountability, and recovery.

The measure of a good plan is not its length. It is whether an ordinary employee, under stress, at an inconvenient hour, can act correctly on it.

What planning covers

  • Scenario definition. The incidents your facility realistically faces, which differ enormously between a hospital, a water treatment plant, and a distribution center.
  • Roles and authority. Who decides, who executes, and who takes over when the primary person is not there. Most plans fail here.
  • Lockdown and egress. How the building secures or evacuates, and the code constraints that govern both.
  • Communication. How people are alerted and how status flows back, including when the network or power is down.
  • Responder access. How fire, EMS, and law enforcement get in fast, with the information they need.
  • Accountability. Assembly points and how you determine who is safe.
  • Recovery. Getting back to operations, and preserving what investigators will need.

Plans that survive contact with reality

A plan is worthless if it lives in a binder nobody opens. Practical planning means:

  • Short, usable action steps at the point of need, rather than a document requiring study.
  • Assumptions checked against the building. If the plan says a door locks, the door has to actually lock, and someone has to have tested it.
  • Written for the staff you have, including night shift, weekend staff, and new hires.
  • Integration with the physical systems, so access control and communications support the plan instead of contradicting it.

The physical security perspective

This is planning from the security and facility side: the doors, the systems, the access, and the building. It complements rather than replaces the work of your emergency management, safety, HR, and legal teams, and for regulated obligations it should sit alongside their programs rather than pretending to substitute for them.

Independent, with nothing to sell you

Wittner Security Consultants staffs no guards, sells no hardware, and does not bid or install the work it recommends. You own every deliverable and can competitively bid it to any installer. Read the full independence policy.

Common questions

Do you write the plan or do we?

Either, and the best results are usually collaborative. Paul brings the physical security and facility perspective and the structure; your team brings operational reality. A plan written entirely by an outsider tends not to fit how the building actually runs.

Does this cover workplace violence prevention requirements?

We address the physical security dimension: access control, egress, environmental design, panic and duress provisions, and how the building supports your response. Workplace violence obligations in California are broader than physical security and involve HR, training, and recordkeeping. We work alongside those programs and do not certify or guarantee compliance with any regulation.

How often should plans be reviewed?

At least annually, and immediately after any of these: an actual incident or near miss, a building change, a significant staffing or leadership change, or a change in the systems the plan depends on. A plan that references a door, a phone tree, or a person that no longer exists is worse than no plan, because people trust it.

Related services

Often paired with this.

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Talk it through with Paul.

Tell him what you are protecting and what prompted the question. He will tell you honestly what the work involves and whether he is the right person for it.

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