4064 Assignments Sp 06

WEEK 2: What is a Crisis

CRISIS MANAGEMENT: MAN 4064

ASSIGNMENT APPENDIX

(C) 2006 Deborah Vidaver-Cohen, PhD

PRINT OUT WEEKLY ASSIGNMENTS AND BRING TO CLASS

(Material in this appendix may not otherwise be copied or distributed

without written permission from the author).

General Assignment Guidelines

The purpose of these writing assignments is to assess your ability to apply concepts from weekly readings to actual crisis management problems. Papers must always include references to specific concepts in the readings. Whenever you include an idea or phrase that is not your own original thought, it must be properly cited.Please use the following citation formats:

From course textbooks: (Author, page #)

From online articles: (Title, paragraph #)

From reprints in Assignment Appendix: (Article Title, page #)*

All papers should be 2-4 pages typed double space and submitted on time in hard copy with signed "Honesty Policy" cover page, included in syllabus. Late or handwritten papers and papers missing signed cover page will not be graded. NO EXCEPTIONS!

Readings denoted CL are reprinted by permission from Mitroff's 2003 book "Crisis Leadership". These will be posted in separate pdf files on my departmental website

To receive 2 points extra credit for news stories, you must attach a brief explanatory statement, described for each assignment. This need only be a few sentences but must be typed. News stories without the statement receive only 1 point.

Feel free to contact me with questions or concerns at any time: [email protected] (Remember: Do NOT use WebCT).I answer student emails immediately whenever I am online: 24/7.

CRISIS MANAGEMENT: MAN 4064

ASSIGNMENT APPENDIX

(C) 2006 Deborah Vidaver-Cohen, PhD

CONTENTS

TOPIC AND ASSIGNMENT SCHEDULE...............................................(i)

FIELDWORK ASSIGNMENT GUIDELINES.......................................1 - 6

CRISIS AUDIT FORMS......................................................................7- 25

WEEKLY ASSIGNMENTS and READINGS.....................................26-60

Week 1: Course Introduction, form workgroups................26-27

Week 2: Psychology of Crisis...................................................28

Week 3: Anatomy of Crisis.......................................................29Week 4: Leadership for Crisis..................................................30Week 5: Signals of Crisis......................................................31-40Week 6: Crisis Preparedness....................................................41 Week 7: Crisis Personnel..........................................................42Week 8: Crisis Communication............................................43-44

Week 9: Crisis Intervention........................................................45

Week 10: Crisis Recovery......................................................46-56

Week 11: Learning from Crisis...................................................57

Week 12: Fieldwork Review.........................................................58

Week 13: Fieldwork Presentations..............................................59

Week 14: Class Critique...............................................................60

MAN 4064 TOPIC AND ASSIGNMENT SCHEDULE:

*Assignment Appendix Readings denoted CL are PDF files on same site

1) January 12: Course Introduction (ATTENDANCE REQUIRED).

Form workgroups, complete and discuss Crisis Styles Questionnaire.

2) January 19: Psychology of Crisis. (ATTENDANCE and ASSIGNMENT REQUIRED)

Mitroff: Preface, Chaps 1-2. Fink: Chapter 16. Academic Honesty Pledge Due

3) January 26: Anatomy of Crisis (GUEST SPEAKER: ATTENDANCE REQUIRED).

Fink: Introduction and Chapters 1-3. Mitroff: pages 187-215

4) February 2: Leadership for Crisis. Fieldwork site approvals DUE

Fink Chapter 4.

Assignment Appendix: (CL 6) Different Languages, (CL 9) Role of Conflict**

Online: http://www.melancon.house.gov/news.asp?ARTICLE3337=4608

5) February 9: Signals of Crisis.

Assignment Appendix: The Lost City, After the Storm,

(CL 8) CL and the Myers Briggs, and (CL 10) Signal Detection ** PBS online: The Storm http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/storm/

6) February 16: Crisis Preparedness. (Crisis Audit Part I Due

Mitroff Chapter 3. Assignment Appendix CL (7) Organization Personalities**

7) February 23: Crisis Personnel: (Crisis Audit Part II Due)

Fink Chapter 7-8. Review CL 6 and CL 9 **

8) March 2: Crisis Communication (GUEST SPEAKER: ATTENDANCE REQUIRED).

Fink 13-14. Assignment Appendix Articles.

9) March 9: Crisis Intervention (Crisis Audit Part III Due)

Fink Chapters 9-11.

10) March 16: Crisis Recovery. Crisis Audit Part IV Due

Fink Chapter 12, and pp 168-189, 203-218: Assignment appendix articles

Online: http://www.unu.edu/unupress/unupbooks/uu21le/uu21le0c.htm

xx) March 23: NO CLASS GO TO FLORIDA FOR SPRING BREAK

11) March 30: Learning from Crisis (Crisis Audit Part V Due)

Fink Chapter 18 and conclusion, Additional Readings To Be Announced.

12) April 6: Fieldwork review.

13) April 13: Fieldwork Presentations (ATTENDANCE REQUIRED). Reports DUE

14) April 20: Class critique (ATTENDANCE REQUIRED) Final Reflection Paper Due

FIELDWORK PROJECT

Due April 13, 2006

The objective of this assignment is to learn how to design a comprehensive crisis management plan for a real-life organization. The project may be completed on your own if you wish, however working with your group is strongly advised as many tasks are involved.These include studying the organization's existing crisis management procedures and overall crisis preparedness, assessing the crisis leadership potential of organization members, determining the organization's ability to recover from crises after they occur and developing recommendations to improve the organization's functioning in each of these key areas.

The assignment is structured to work on throughout the semester, using the Crisis Audit as the foundation for the final report. The Crisis Audit involves interviewing members of your fieldwork organization and collecting relevant documents that will help you evaluate the organization's crisis preparedness and see which areas need improvement. When your report is complete you must meet again with someone from the organization to discuss your findings and recommendations.

You should begin collecting data as soon as possible so you can meet the target dates below.If working on this as a group, you may divide the data collection and writing tasks. However, every member of the group should plan to visit the fieldwork organization at least once during the term and all should attend the meeting to present your findings unless work or class commitments make this impossible (please provide me with documentation if this is the case).

TARGET DATES (2 point deduction for each target date is missed)

2/2: Confirm fieldwork sites: Submit signed approval from organization contact person.

2/6: Begin collecting data for Crisis Audit: Submit signed confirmation for each visit.

2/16: Crisis Audit Part I Due.

2/23: Crisis Audit Part II Due.

3/9: Crisis Audit Part III Due

3/16: Crisis Audit Part IV due

3/30: Crisis Audit Part V due

4/11: Last day to schedule feedback meeting with organization members. Meeting may be scheduled any time between March 31 and April 11.

4/13: Final Report Due

FIELDWORK PROJECT (continued)

GRADING:

Each written section of the final report should be 2-4 pages typed double space and will be graded on a 4 point scale: 4=Excellent, 3=Very good, 2=Good, 1=Fair. You must cite specific concepts from course readings to support all assessments and recommendations.

You may choose "individual grading" based on the sections each student prepares, or you may choose "group grading" using the attached group member evaluation form. If you choose the individual grading option, each student will prepare two sections and the score on each section will be multiplied by 5. If you are preparing the report on your own, the scores will not be multiplied but you will automatically receive 1 extra point per section. In groups with more than 6 members, I will assign additional tasks to balance the workload with the smaller groups but not until after the drop date when we know how many people actually remain in the class.The Crisis Audit will not be graded as it is merely a way to organize your data collection.

The final report should be professionally presented in a binder with table of contents and bibliography of all sources included. Begin each section on a new page and indicate which students are responsible for each. Unprofessional report format or missing contents and bibliography will result in point deductions from the total score.

REPORT CONTENTS

I. Organization Overview and Executive Summary (4 points)

a) Describe in detail your organization's product/service, industry, and organizational structure.

(b) Identify specific crises to which organizations in this industry would be especially vulnerable(outside research required).

(c) Prepare a comprehensive "executive summary" of your audit findings and recommendations

II. Crisis Preparedness

(a) Assess how well your organization is structured to meet the crises identified in Section IV of your audit. Consider Signal Detection, Monitoring and Organizational Policies and Procedures. Thoroughly analyze each relevant item in Part I of the Crisis audit and apply specific concepts from course readings to support your analysis.

(b) Based on the analysis above, develop specific recommendations for how your organization can improve its crisis preparedness in each area of Part I, supporting your recommendations with specific concepts from course readings. If you feel the organization is adequately prepared, compare it to other cases of poor preparation studied in class and provide specific examples of how your organization is better prepared.


III. Crisis Leadership.*

* If more than 3 people on the Team, this question can be split among 2 group members.

a) Critically assess the crisis leadership potential of your organization's top management, as well as that of each member of the crisis team you identified in Part II of the Crisis Audit. Support your assessment with specific concepts from course readings.

b) Discuss how well prepared you believe these individuals will be to handle each phase of the crises identified in Section III of the Crisis Audit. Support your assessment with specific concepts from course readings.

(c) Develop recommendations for ways each individual on the team could improve their potential for crisis leadership. If you believe there is no need for improvement, compare the personnel in your organization with poor crisis leaders studied in class and provide specific examples of how your organization's personnel are more effective.

IV. Crisis Communication

a) Analyze the effectiveness of your organization's internal and external communication mechanisms from Part III of the Crisis Audit, considering both strengths and weaknesses. Support your analysis with specific concepts from course readings.

b) Based on this analysis, develop recommendations for ways the organization could improve both internal and external communications in the event of the specific crises identified in Part III of the Audit. Support your recommendations with specific concepts from course readings. If you believe there is no need for improvement, compare the communications strategy in your organization with cases of poor crisis communications studied in class and provide specific examples how your organization's approach is more effective.

V. Analysis of First Crises from Audit Part III

a) Describe the crisis and the "worst case" effects it could have on the organization.

b) Identify all organizational processes vulnerable to harm from this crisis (most to least vulnerable), discuss specific damages the crisis could cause to these processes and suggest specific policies, procedures or resources that could protect them. Support your analysis with specific concepts from course readings

c) Identify all stakeholders vulnerable to harm from this crisis (from most to least vulnerable) discuss specific harms the crisis could cause to these stakeholders and suggest specific policies, procedures or resources that could protect them. Support your analysis with specific concepts from course readings.

d) Discuss anything about the overall structure, culture, and management style of the organization you think could be changed to decrease these vulnerabilities.


VI. Analysis of Second Crises from Audit Part III

a) Describe the potential crisis and the "worst case" effects it could have on the organization.



d) Discuss anything about the overall structure, culture, and management style of the organization you think could be changed to decrease these vulnerabilities. Support your analysis with specific concepts from course readings.

VII. Analysis of Third Crises from Audit Part III

a) Describe the potential crisis and the "worst case" effects it could have on the organization.



d) Discuss anything about the overall structure, culture, and management style of the organization you think could be changed to decrease these vulnerabilities. Support your analysis with specific concepts from course readings.

VIII. Damage Containment

(a) Considering your individual and group work from Week 9, discuss whether your organization is well positioned to contain damage from the crises identified in Part III of the Audit. Support your analysis with specific concepts from course readings.

(b) Develop recommendations to improve your organization's damage containment strategies. If you believe your organization is well positioned to contain damage, compare it to cases of poor damage containment studied in class and provide specific examples how your organization's approach is more effective.


IX. Crisis Recovery.

a) From the data in Part IV of the Audit, assess how well you believe your organization is positioned to recover from the crises identified above. Support your assessment with specific concepts from course readings.

b) Develop a detailed plan for exactly what the organization should do to recover from the crises identified in Audit Part III. Consider issues of how to preserve relationships with key stakeholders as well as business continuity. If you think the organization is well positioned to contain damage from a crisis, compare it to poorly positioned companies studied in class and provide specific examples of how your organization is more effective.

X: Learning from Crisis

a) From the data in Part V of the Audit, discuss the lessons your organization learned from past crisis experiences.

(b) Determine whether or not they should have learned additional lessons, supporting your assessment with specific concepts from course readings. If they did learn effectively, compare their success with the failure of other companies studied in class and provide specific examples of how your organization was more successful.

XI: Presentation Materials

(a) Prepare an agenda for your feedback meeting with the organization and create a professional quality presentation of your findings and recommendations, including visual materials. NOTE: Students completing this part of the project must select from Sections I through X for their second section so that everyone has at least one analytical section to prepare.

XII: Report Preparation

(b) Reformat all individually prepared sections so all are consistent, spell checked, and grammar corrected. Compile all material in professional report format and prepare two copies, one for the company and one to submit for your grade. NOTE: Students completing this part of the project must select from Sections I through X for their second section so that everyone has at least one analytical section to prepare.

Group Member Evaluation Form

Your Name __________________Group Code ________

Evaluation Instructions: Please list the names of all group members (including yourself) in the spaces below. Next, allocate 100 total points among all members based on your perception of their contributions.

For example, if you had 5 members in your group and everyone contributed equally to the project, you would give each member 20 points. If people did not contribute equally to the project, change your allocations accordingly.

Student Name: ________________________________________ ___________ points







Total points must equal @100 pts.

If appropriate, please specify in the space provided below the reason(s) why your point allocations to a particular student or students is significantly lower than the other members of the group.

THE CRISIS AUDIT: Deborah Vidaver-Cohen, PhD (c) 2006

A Crisis Audit involves the close examination of an organization to identify policies, procedures, personnel and resources that can be used to prevent or recover from a crisis. It also involves identifying potential vulnerabilities to various crisis scenarios. The questions below provide the framework for a Basic Crisis Audit. To complete the audit you will need to spend time interviewing management or employees at your fieldwork organization. This audit provides the foundation for the Crisis Management Plan you will submit end of term.

PART I: CRISIS PREPAREDNESS PROFILE

1. Organizational Portrait

The first step in a crisis audit is to gather key facts about an organization. Often you can identify crisis vulnerabilities simply by know the industry, size or age of the organization, the complexity of its structure, or its network of relationships. Please add anything else to the profile that you believe would be relevant to assessing your organization's vulnerability to crisis.

Industry__________________Product or Service___________________________________

Number of Employees:______ Number of Facilities: ____ Number of Customers: ______ Number of Subcontractors: ____ Years of Operation: ____

Governance (sole proprietor, publicly traded, partnership etc)_________________________

Divisions/Departments and # of employees in each: 1______________ 2_______________3 ___________________ 4_________________5_______________ 6________________

7 ___________________ 8 ________________ 9______________10_________________

Regulatory agencies for organization: 1_______2________3________4_________5________

Transaction Partners (Suppliers, Distributors, Creditors, Subcontractors, etc):

1____________ 2______________ 3 ______________ 4 ____________5______________

6 ____________ 7______________ 8 ______________ 9____________10_____________

Media Visibility (Rate 1= lowest > 5=highest) Industry visibility ___ Organization visibility ___

Product Liability Potential (Rate 1=lowest > 5 = highest)____

Employee Injury Potential (Rate 1=lowest > 5 = highest)____

Regulatory Violation Potential (Rate 1=lowest > 5 = highest)____

AUDIT PART I: PROFILE (continued)

2. Coordination and Response Mechanisms

The degree to which employees are informed about organization plans and expectations can have a strong impact on whether a prodromal crisis will turn into an acute crisis. Rate your organization on the following criteria, using a scale of 1-5 (1 = Lowest, 5 = highest).

Units of the organization stay informed of other units' activities _____

The organization has a clearly articulated strategic plan _____

The organization has a clearly communicated statement of vision, mission and values ____.

People in the organization know which behaviors are rewarded or punished ____

If problems arise in each of the following areas, employees in these areas know how to respond quickly and effectively (rate for each problem).

1. Financial ___

2. Managerial____

3. Legal ___

4. Technological ____

5. Operational ____

6. Human Resources ___

7. Customer Relations ____

8. External Relations___

(Please add any other criteria you think are uniquely relevant to your organization or industry)

__________________________________________________________________________

__________________________________________________________________________

__________________________________________________________________________

__________________________________________________________________________

__________________________________________________________________________

AUDIT PART I: PROFILE (continued)

3. Signal Detection Systems

In nearly all crisis situations, there are warning signs. If detected early enough, they can help your organization better prepare for and manage crises -- minimizing the impact of crises on the organization. A crisis audit should provide a good list of key issues to monitor. Some will be internal, such as employee-relations problems, and operational procedures. Others will be external such as industry changes or environmental, social and economic problems. Using the same scoring system (1-5), assess how well your organization currently performs in each of these signal-monitoring areas. If an area is not applicable to your organization write "NA". As with Item 2 above, Please add any others you think are appropriate to your organization.

Internal Signal Detection

Monitors employee productivity, morale, absenteeism and turnover _____

Monitors product quality _____

Monitors performance of internal communication systems and info technologies _____

Monitors performance of equipment and production processes _____

Monitors customer satisfaction _____

Monitors organization accounting practices and other financial transactions ______

Monitors relations with transaction partners_____

A clear chain of communication exists to report threatening signals _____

External Signal Detection

Monitors performance and stability of transaction partners ______

Watches trade publications and newsletters specific to the industry ____

Monitors the activities of competitors _____

Monitors activities of transaction partners ____

Maintains contact with regulatory agencies, trade associations, and others in industry to stay informed on emerging issues and develop "help systems" in the event of crisis ___

Monitors news media and internet to stay up to date about environmental, social or economic issues that may affect your organization, your industry, or your community____

CRISIS AUDIT PART II:

CRISIS MANAGEMENT PERSONNEL

The ability to of organizational personnel to manage all aspects of the crisis from crisis prevention through crisis recovery is especially critical to effective crisis management. This section of the audit provides guidelines to assess the crisis management qualifications of organizational members.

1. Crisis Leadership Team

To be truly "crisis prepared", companies should have a crisis leadership team composed of individuals with the following attributes:

Practical/professional expertise (e.g. managerial, legal, operational, technological, financial, employee relations, customer service, external communications, security etc).

Interpersonal skills (perceptiveness, empathy, being a good listener, being a clear communicator).

Problem solving ability (clear thinking, decisive, calm under pressure, fast learner, able to see the big picture, takes a long-term perspective).

Formal Authority (empowered to make decisions on behalf of the organization).

Informal Authority (respected by others within the organization)

In this section you will identify organization personnel with the key areas of practical and professional expertise noted below (you may add others areas that are relevant). Then on a scale of 1-5 (1= lowest, 5 = highest) rate each person on their interpersonal skills, problem-solving skills, formal authority and informal authority. As each organization may have several members with the required skills, please make additional copies of the list as appropriate.

1. Managerial expertise (Name): __________________________________________

Title:______________________________________________________________

Home #: _______________Cell #_______________Email____________________

Interpersonal skills: ____ Problem solving abilities: ____

Formal Authority: ____ Informal Authority: ____

2. Legal expertise (Name): __________________________________________________

Title:__________________________________________________________________

Home #: _______________Cell #_______________Email_______________________



AUDIT PART II: PERSONNEL (continued)

1. Crisis Leadership Team (continued)

3. Operational expertise (Name): _____________________________________________

Title:__________________________________________________________________

Home #: _______________Cell #_______________Email_______________________



4. Financial expertise (Name): _______________________________________________

Title:________________________________________________________________

Home #: _______________Cell #_______________Email_______________________



5. Technological expertise (Name): _________________________________________

Title:________________________________________________________________

Home #: _______________Cell #_______________Email_____________________



6. Employee Relations Expertise (Name): ____________________________________

Title:________________________________________________________________

Home #: _______________Cell #_______________Email_____________________



7. Customer Relations expertise (Name): ____________________________________

Title:________________________________________________________________

Home #: _______________Cell #_______________Email_____________________




1. Crisis Leadership Team (continued)

8. External Relations expertise (Name): _____________________________________

Title:________________________________________________________________

Home #: _______________Cell #_______________Email_____________________



9. Security expertise (Name): _____________________________________________

Title:________________________________________________________________

Home #: _______________Cell #_______________Email_____________________




2. Crisis Spokespersons

Selecting the right crisis communications spokesperson is essential. How your organization handles all aspects of communication necessary during a crisis can either make or break your organization's reputation in the public eye. Having one spokesperson for all media communications is the best way to ensure the consistency of messages and response communications. However, it is also prudent to identify a back-up person in the event that the main, or delegated, spokesperson is unavailable or implicated in the crisis (Grant & Powell, 1999).

To be effective, a spokesperson must possess certain attributes listed below (Covello, 1995). Identify two individuals in the organization who best demonstrate each attribute.If an individual is not listed in Section 1 above, indicate their title/position in the organization.

Possesses sufficient authority to represent organization: 1.____________2.___________

Possesses relevant technical knowledge about the crisis: 1.___________ 2.___________

Communicates technical facts in understandable way: 1._____________ 2.___________

Able to respond to sensitive questions: 1.__________________2.___________________

Resourceful and a quick learner: 1._____________________2._____________________

Makes high quality decisions: 1._______________________2._____________________

Possesses excellent communication skills: 1._________________2.________________

Works well under pressure: 1._______________________2.______________________

Able to learn from mistakes: 1.________________________2._____________________

Perceived as trustworthy and credible: 1.___________________2.__________________

Person with most attributes ______________ Person with second most_____________

Person with third most ______________ Person with forth most__________________

3. Leadership Potential

Given the data from Sections 1 and 2 above, determine who would be the best to lead the organization through each phase of crisis.

Best leader for prodromal crisis prevention_____________________

Best leader for acute crisis recovery____________________

Best leader for chronic crisis learning_____________________

CRISIS AUDIT PART III: CRISIS INTERVENTION

Effective crisis intervention requires determining in advance (1) types of crises that pose the greatest threat to your organization, (2) organizational processes and stakeholders that would be vulnerable to harm from these crises, (3) policies, procedures and resources currently in place to protect both organizational processes and stakeholders from harm, and (4) a clearly articulated strategy for communicating about such crises with both stakeholders and the public.

1. Crisis Scenarios

Describe three crisis scenarios that could cause the greatest potential harm to your organization. Examples include product recall, disease epidemic technology failure, production malfunction, personnel problems, customer loss, regulation issues, media scrutiny, environmental, political or economic crises etc. (NOTE: If your organization is significantly vulnerable to additional crises please reformat page to proceed through the same assessment for these crises as well).

1. _______________________________________________________________

2. _______________________________________________________________

3. _______________________________________________________________

2a. Organizational Process Vulnerabilities

For each crisis described above, identify three organizational processes that would be particularly vulnerable to harm from that crisis, with most vulnerable listed as #1 and least vulnerable #3. For example: production, R&D, operations management, product or service delivery, communications, Information technology, transportation, HR, marketing etc. etc.If more than three processes are vulnerable, please reformat page to add them.

Crisis 1:

Vulnerable process (1) ______________________________________________________



Crisis 2:




Crisis 3:




AUDIT PART III: INTERVENTION (continued)

2b. Stakeholder Vulnerabilities

Identify all organizational stakeholder groups that would be vulnerable to harm from the crises described above, with most vulnerable # 1 and least vulnerable #5. Consider Customers, Employees, Investors/Owners, Local Community and Transaction Partners (e.g. suppliers, distributors, creditors, subcontractors, etc). Reformat page to add stakeholders if necessary.

Crisis 1:

Vulnerable stakeholder (1) ___________________________________________________





Crisis 2:






Crisis 3:







3a. Organizational Process Protections

Identify up to three policies, procedures or resources (PP or R) the organization has in place to protect the processes identified above from harm in a crisis. Score each according to anticipated effectiveness in protecting a particular process from harm: 5 = "extremely effective" to 1 = "extremely ineffective". Reformat as required for additional processes and protections. (NOTE: Since process vulnerabilities may overlap for the various crises described, there is no need to sort process protections by specific crisis type).

Vulnerable Process 1______________________________________________________

PP or R (1.a)_____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (1.b) _____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (1.c) _____________________________________________________Score___


PP or R (2.a)_____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (2.b) _____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (2.c) _____________________________________________________Score___


PP or R (3.a)_____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (3.b) _____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (3.c) _____________________________________________________Score___


PP or R (4.a)_____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (4.b) _____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (4.c) _____________________________________________________Score___


PP or R (5.a)_____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (5.b) _____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (5.c) _____________________________________________________Score___


3b. Stakeholder Protections

Repeat the same steps above for organizational stakeholders. Reformat pages as necessary.

Vulnerable Stakeholder 1____________________________________________________

PP or R (1.a)_____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (1.b) _____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (1.c) _____________________________________________________Score___


PP or R (1.a) _____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (1.b) _____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (1.c) _____________________________________________________Score___


PP or R (2.a) _____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (2.b) _____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (2.c) _____________________________________________________Score___


PP or R (3.a) _____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (3.b) _____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (3.c) _____________________________________________________Score___


PP or R (4.a) _____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (4.b) _____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (4.c) _____________________________________________________Score___

Vulnerable stakeholder (5)___________________________________________________

PP or R (5.a) _____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (5.b) _____________________________________________________Score___

PP or R (5.c) _____________________________________________________Score___


4a. Crisis Communications Plans

In this section you will assess your organization's crisis communication strategy. Circle "yes" or "no" for each criterion. If "yes", briefly describe the process.

Emergency communications contacts accessible. yes no

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________________________

Back up communications technologies in place. yes no

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________________________

Designated crisis communications team in place. yes no

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________________________

Crisis spokespersons identified. yes no

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________________________

Crisis communications training required for key employees. yes no

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________________________

Established procedures to communicate with employees in event of crisis. yes no

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________________________

Formal media communications procedures in place. yes no

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________________________


4a. Crisis Communications Plans (continued)

Formal plans in place to communicate with key stakeholders in event of crisis.....

customers yes no

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________________________

investors yes no

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________________________

regulators yes no

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________________________

local community yes no

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________________________

suppliers yes no

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________________________

distributors yes no

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________________________

contractors yes no

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________________________

other yes no

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________________________


4b. Crisis Communications Experience

In this space provided below, describe the organization's most successful and least successful crisis communication experiences.

Most Successful

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_________________________________________________________________________

Least Successful

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

CRISIS AUDIT PART IV: CRISIS RECOVERY

Effective crisis recovery requires organizations to quickly mobilize a variety of service and operational resources. Rapid mobilization depends on the ability to identify these resources in advance and knowing how to access them immediately.

Examples of service resources relevant to successful crisis recovery include transportation, insurance, medical care, government agency assistance and psychological support. Examples of operational resources include first aid materials, communications resources (extra phone lines, cell phones, fax machines, computers etc), functional resources (electrical generators, water, gas, batteries, power-free illumination sources, television, radio, heating/ cooling alternatives etc). In the spaces below, list all resources relevant to managing the crises identified in Part III, as well as procedures used to by the organization to access them.Add pages as necessary.

1. Service Resources

Resource ___________________Access Procedure__________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________

AUDIT PART IV: RECOVERY (continued)

2. Operational Resources


____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________

CRISIS AUDIT PART V: LEARNING FROM CRISIS

Every crisis experience contains important lessons that can improve your organization's crisis management capabilities. In this section, list all crises your organization has experienced, describe key lessons learned and note what should be done differently to improve management of similar crises in the future. Add or reformat pages as necessary. .

Crisis Experience:______________________________________________________________

Lessons Learned:______________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________

Suggestions for Improvement: ____________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________


Lessons Learned:______________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________


Lessons Learned:______________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________

AUDIT PART V: LEARNING FROM CRISIS (continued)


Lessons Learned:______________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________


Lessons Learned:______________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________


Lessons Learned:______________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________

AUDIT PART V: LEARNING FROM CRISIS (continued)


Lessons Learned:______________________________________________________________

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WEEK 1: 1/12

WEEK 1 -- JANUARY 12: COURSE INTRODUCTION

ATTENDANCE REQUIRED

Review Course Requirements.

Form Workgroups.

Complete Crisis Style Questionnaire.

Review Week 2 Assignment.

WEEK 1 (continued)

CRISIS STYLES QUESTIONNAIRE

(C) 2006 Deborah Vidaver-Cohen

(May not be reprinted with out written permission of the author)

Please enter appropriate number:

Always=5, Often=4, Sometimes=3, Rarely = 2, Never = 1

1. I am good at bringing people together_____

2. When I encounter a challenge I react quickly _____

3. I am uncomfortable listening to other peoples problems_____

4. I consider myself self-disciplined _____

5. It is hard for me to see how events and situations are connected_____

6. I formulate plans and stick to them_____

7. It is easy for me to manage the challenges of daily life___

8. What happens in life is beyond most peoples' control_____

9. I work best under pressure_____

10. People are comfortable telling me their problems_____

11. It is hard for me to admit when i make a mistake_____

12. When i encounter obstacles it is easy for me to switch direction_____

13. I like to plan ahead_____

14. I pay close attention to everything going on around me_____

15. When I have a crisis I wait to see what will happen next _____

16. I am responsible for what happens in my life_____

17. When I encounter a challenge I feel energized_____

18. I am interested in other people's opinions_____

19. i am an impatient person_____

20. When I have a crisis I deal with it immediately_____

21. I go out of my way to learn new things_____

22. It is easier for me to manage emergencies than the challenges of daily life_____

23. It is hard for me to confide about myself to other people_____

24. Honesty is important when dealing with crisis___

25. I am willing to change my mind _____

26. I consider myself a risk-taker_____

27. When i encounter challenge i feel frustrated_____

28. I have many close personal relationships____

29. I spend a lot of time thinking about how i could do things better_____

30. I consider myself well organized _____

31. It is easier for me to manage emergencies than the challenges of daily life_____

32. When I encounter a challenge I carefully study the issues _____

33. I am uncomfortable examining my own motives and behavior_____

34. People look to me for guidance when problems come up _____

35. I am overwhelmed by the challenges of daily life___

36. I work best when i have lots of time to complete my task_____

37. When I encounter a challenge I feel frustrated _____

38. I am well prepared when i travel_____

39. When I have a crisis I try to figure out why it happened_____

40. I let nothing interfere with pursuing my goals_____

WEEK 2: 1/19

WEEK 2 JANUARY 19: PSYCHOLOGY OF CRISIS*

ATTENDANCE AND ASSIGNMENT REQUIRED

Academic Honesty Pledge Due

READ: (1) Mitroff: Preface & Chapters 1-2 (2) Fink Chapter 16.

CRISIS PROBLEM ON YOUR OWN:*

For this and all future assignments, make sure you refer to specific concepts from the readings to support your answers, using the citation format described in the "General Assignment Guidelines" on the cover page of this Appendix.

1. Describe the most significant crisis you have experienced. Any personal, organizational, social or environmental crisis is appropriate including hurricanes!

2. Explain how this crisis fits into either the "normal" or "abnormal" category.

3. Describe how experiencing this crisis affected your key assumptions about the world, about other people, about organizations, or about yourself.

4. Describe any "betrayals" you experienced in conjunction with this crisis.

5.. Discuss how you reacted to the crisis in terms of Mitroff's "defense mechanisms", and/or Fink's "coping strategies" (139-141).

6. Analyze the quality of your decision-making during and after the crisis, considering specific descriptions of decision-making errors on pp. 144 -147.

EXTRA CREDIT (1 point): Do you agree or disagree with Mitroff's statement about "projection" (page 48)? Explain the reasons for your response.

IN CLASS:

Students will share individual papers with their workgroup to design strategies that can help organizations cope with the emotional effects of crisis among key stakeholders and improve decision-making during and after crisis. Groups will present their solutions to the class..

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* NOTE: Effective crisis management involves not only creativity and critical thinking but significant self-reflection as well. This exercise addresses the self-reflection component, which some students may find difficult and uncomfortable. However, in order to successfully manage crises in organizations it is important to understand your own psychological responses to crisis and how these may affect your perspective on the crisis experience of others.

WEEK 3: 1/26

WEEK 3 -- 1/26: ANATOMY OF CRISIS

GUEST SPEAKER: RONALD MINCHEFF. ATTENDANCE REQUIRED

READ: (1) Fink: Introduction and Chapters 1-3. (2) Mitroff: pages 187-215

CRISIS PROBLEM ON YOUR OWN:

1. From your own personal or workplace experience, describe one example of an "acute" crisis and one example of a "chronic" crisis, using SPECIFIC examples from the text to explain WHY you decided the incident fit into the category you assigned it. The crisis you described for the first assignment may be used again for this assignment.

2. Discuss what you think could have been done differently to avert these crises during the "Challenge" Phase (what Fink calls Prodromal phase), using SPECIFIC examples from the text to support your analysis.

3. Review the website for our Guest Speaker's company and prepare three questions for our guest (http://www.edelman.com/ - read all sections under the "About Us" heading, as well as the section on crisis management: http://www.edelman.com/expertise/practices/crisis/. These questions will count for your 1 "group point" on the week's assignment.

EXTRA CREDIT (2 POINTS): Print out and submit a news story illustrating either an acute or chronic crisis and attach a brief statement explaining which type of crisis it is and why you have classified it as such.

IN CLASS:

We will discuss students' crisis problem assignments and next week's Fieldwork update due. Following this discussion will be presentation by our guest speaker, Ronald Mincheff from Edelman Public Relations (see bio below).

Ronald Mincheff joined Edelman in 1997 and is the managing director of the Brazil office. He is responsible for client strategy, crisis communication, general account and team supervision, as well as new business development. He is currently working on behalf of clients including Air France, Amadeus, AMD, Bacardi-Martini, Boeing, PepsiCo, Samsung, UPS and Xerox.

Mr. Mincheff joined the Edelman team after a four and a half-year career with Burson-Marsteller, initially in its Miami office, then in its So Paulo subsidiary. He has experience with a host of influential clients, including Alcatel, A.T. Kearney, AT&T, The Bahamas Ministry of Tourism, Bunge, Colgate-Palmolive, Eli Lilly, Ericsson, Fidelity Investments, IBM, Iveco, Kimberly Clark, Monsanto, Nasdaq, Pharmacia & Upjohn, Philip Morris, Quaker, Rio 2004, Unilever and Visa among others. Mincheff holds a Bachelor of Science in Public Relations and Education from the University of Florida. He is fluent in English, Portuguese and Spanish.

WEEK 4: 2/2

WEEK 4 2/2: LEADERSHIP FOR CRISIS

Fieldwork site approvals DUE: Dates confirmed for Data Collection

READ: (1) Fink Chapter 4,

(2) Assignment Appendix: CL 6 (Different Languages) & CL 9 (Role of Conflict).

(3)http://www.melancon.house.gov/SupportingFiles/documents/AnalysisofBrownEmails.pdf (PRINT OUT ARTICLE AND BRING TO CLASS)


You may choose either the first or second question set for your paper. If you choose the second set, you must still be prepared to discuss the Hirschfield case in class.

1. Answer the following questions about the Hollywood case from Fink Chapter 4:

a. Identify Hirschfield's "Psychological Language Style" using Figure 6-1 and his "Conflict Management Style" using Figure 9-1. Give SPECIFIC evidence from the readings to support your classifications.

b. Would a different "language style" and/or "conflict management style" on Hirschfield's part have helped prevent the Challenge Phase of Hollywoodgate from entering the Acute Phase? If so, why? If not, why not? Support your assessment with SPECIFIC concepts from the readings.

c. Identify any behaviors from Figure 6-3 that might have helped Hirschfield manage the Chronic Phase of Hollywoodgate more successfully and support your assessment with SPECIFIC evidence from the readings.

2. Considering the way you handled the personal crises described in previous weeks' assignments, answer the following questions about your own crisis leadership style.

a. Identify your own "Psychological Language Style" using Figure 6-1, and your own "Conflict Management Style" using Figure 9-1. Give SPECIFIC evidence from the readings to support your classifications.

b. Given your response to (2a) above, and considering Figure 6-3, discuss how you could improve your crisis leadership abilities. Support your assessment with SPECIFIC concepts from the readings.

EXTRA CREDIT (2 POINTS): Print out and submit a news story illustrating exemplary crisis leadership or a failure of crisis leadership. Explain your assessment.

IN CLASS:

As a group, analyze the online article and critique Michael Brown's crisis leadership style in terms of the readings from CL 6 and CL 9. NOTE: Only students who submit pre-printed article about Brown's emails will be eligible for groupwork point.

WEEK 5: 2/9

WEEK 5 2/9: SIGNALS OF CRISIS

READ: (1) Assignment Appendix: CL 8 (CL & Myers Briggs) CL 10 (Signal Detection).

(2) Articles attached: "The Lost City", "New Orleans after the Storm"

(3) PBS online: The Storm http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/storm/

VIEW FILM ONLINE (if you have lowspeed and film breaks up click on HIGH DSL (though this gives audio only)


1. From Table 8-1 in CL 8, determine which factors contributed to the crisis in New Orleans during and after Hurricane Katrina.

2. Using Table 8-2 in CL 8, determine which of these systems failed in New Orleans.

3. Considering the Signal Detection Lessons in CL 10, discuss which lessons were ignored by the key people involved in the New Orleans Katrina crisis (Nagin, Blanco, Bown, Chertoff and President Bush).

EXTRA CREDIT (2 POINTS): Print out and turn in a news story illustrating success or failure of crisis management strategies here in South Florida related to Hurricane Katrina or Hurricane Wilma. Explain the reasons for your assessment.

IN CLASS:

Students will share individual papers with their workgroup to develop a "signal detection plan" that might have prevented the crisis in New Orleans during and after Hurricane Katrina. Consider each system that failed from your answers to question 2 above. Groups will present their solutions to the class.

WEEK 5 (continued)

The Lost City What Went Wrong: Devastating a swath of the South, Katrina plunged New Orleans into agony. The story of a stormand a disastrously slow rescue.

Newsweek

The original version of this story incorrectly reported that Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco had been "hesitant to declare martial law or a state of emergency." In fact, Gov. Blanco declared a state of emergency Friday, Aug. 26, before Katrina hit the state.

Sept. 12, 2005 issue - It wasn't exactly a surprise. "This ain't gonna last," New Orleans City Council President Oliver Thomas told his security guard as they watched the waters of Lake Pontchartrain rising and racing and eating away at the dirt levee beneath the concrete floodwall built to protect New Orleans from disaster. It was 4 o'clock on Sunday afternoon, Aug. 28. Hurricane Katrina was still 14 hours away, but the sea surge had begun. Thomas returned to the city's hurricane war room and announced, to anyone who was listening, "The water's coming into the city."

Thomas was asleep on his office couch early Tuesday morning when he was awakened by the sound of banging on his door and someone yelling, "The levee broke!" Thomas stood up on his soaked carpet and felt as though he were standing in concrete. He was paralyzed, he later said, by the fear of predictions coming true. Thomas, who had been rescued off the roof of his house in New Orleans during Hurricane Betsy in 1965, had been a city councilman for a dozen years. His specialty is water. He knew all about the studies and reports and dire warnings stacked up on the desks of bureaucrats, he knew about all the relief and reconstruction and restoration projects that had been discussed but never paid for or carried out, and he knew his beloved old city was doomed.

A few rescuers were ready, but precious few. On Monday morning, as the storm slammed into the Gulf Coast, Col. Tim Tarchick of the 920th Rescue Wing, Air Force Reserve Command, got on the phone to call every agency he could think of to ask permission to take his three rescue helicopters into the disaster zone as soon as the storm abated. The response was noncommittal. FEMA, the federal agency that is supposed to handle disasters, told Tarchick that it wasn't authorized to task military units. That had to come from the Defense Department. Tarchick wasn't able to cut through the red tape until 4 p.m. Tuesdaymore than 24 hours after the storm had passed. His crews plucked hundreds of people off rooftops, but when they delivered them to an assigned landing zone, there was "total chaos. No food, no water, no bathrooms, no nothing." There was "no structure, no organization, no command center," Tarchick told NEWSWEEK.

Only despair. The news could not have been more dispiriting: The reports of gunfire at medical-relief helicopters. The stories of pirates capturing rescue boats. The reports of police standing and watching lootersor joining them. The TV images of hundreds and thousands of people, mostly black and poor, trapped in the shadow of the Superdome. And most horrific: the photographs of dead people floating facedown in the sewage or sitting in wheelchairs where they died, some from lack of water. For many across the city and the Gulf Coast, prayer seemed one of their few options. On CNN, Mayor C. Ray Nagin asked the country to "pray for us," a plea repeated by survivors who needed that, and much more.

WEEK 5 (continued)

New Orleans has long been an inspiration to soulful writers and artists who sing the blues. But there was nothing romantic about Katrina's wake. Most of the poets had headed for higher ground (although legendary R&B man "Fats" Domino stayed, was reported missing, then found alive). Left behind were the poor who couldn't get out, a few defiant members of the local gentry and gangs of predators.

No one seemed to have any idea how many people died, but it was clearly the worst natural disaster since a hurricane wiped out Galveston, Texas, in 1900, killing 6,000 to 12,000 people. No major American city had been evacuated since Richmond and Atlanta in the Civil War. The economic cost will be enormous, starting with gasoline prices jumping to more than $3 a gallon. The political cost to President Bush could also be stiff. When Air Force One dipped below the clouds on Wednesday so the president could peer out the window down at the disaster, the image was uncomfortably imperial. A folksier Bush toured the wretched region on Friday, hugged some victims and did a rare but necessary thing: he admitted that the results of the relief effort had been "not acceptable."

Day after day of images showed exhausted families and their crying children stepping around corpses while they begged: Where is the water? Where are the buses? They seemed helpless, powerless, at the mercy of forces far beyond their control. The lack of rapid response left people in the United States, and all over the world, wondering how an American city could look like Mogadishu or Port-au-Prince. The refugee crisisa million people without homes, jobs, schoolshardly fit George W. Bush's vision of the American Colossus.

What went wrong? Just about everything. How the system failed is a tangled story, but the basic narrative is becoming clearer: hesitancy, bureaucratic rivalries, failures of leadership from city hall to the White House and epically bad luck combined to create a morass. In the early aftermath, fingers pointed in all directions. The president was to blame; no, the looters. No, the bureaucrats. No, the local politicians. It was FEMA's faultunless it was the Department of Homeland Security's. Or the Pentagon's. Certainly the government failed, and the catastrophe exposed, for all the world to see, raw racial divisions.

Bush's many critics will say that the president was disengaged, on vacation, distracted by Iraq and insensitive to the needs of poor black people. The White House blames the magnitude of the storm itself, patchy information on the ground and a confused chain of command, according to a senior Bush aide who requests anonymity in order to speak freely about internal administration discussions. The truth probably lies somewhere in between. Bush is fighting a war, and he is sometimes slow to react, and he may have been lulled by early reports that New Orleans had been spared the worst of the storm. These are all legitimate excuses. Still, we expect more from a president.

Mother Nature was a major villain. A hurricane like Katrina packs the energy of a 10-megaton nuclear bombexploding every 20 minutes. Global warming does not explain the recent increase in hurricanes, the scientists say. A natural cycle of rising and lowering ocean temperatures accounts for the frequency of tropical storms; a lull in hurricanes from about the mid-'60s to the '90s was the exception, not the norm. But man may be making storms worse. As the planet heats, hurricanes will become more intense. And during that period of relative calm, homeowners and industry crowded the fragile shore all along the path of hurricanes in the South and Eastern United States.

WEEK 5 (continued)

Man robbed the Mississippi Delta of its natural protection from stormsironically, to prevent flooding. Dikes and levees that channeled silt, and would have normally been allowed to build up the bayous and outer islands surrounding New Orleans, have instead been left to sink slowly into the mud. The wetlands along the Gulf Coast have been disappearing at the rate of about 33 football fields a day.

The government knew this and planned for the "Big One," at least in theory. The latest exercise by state, local and federal officials, looking at the impact of a fictional "Hurricane Pam" last year, pretty well predicted the crushing impact of Katrina on New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. But the Department of Homeland Security, which is supposed to coordinate the relief effort for all disasters, natural and man-made, has been more focused on the terror threat since the sprawling agency was created post 9/11. Planners spend more time preparing for exotic (but less predictable) biochem or dirty-bomb attacks, which are more likely to get funding from Congress or the administration. (Though given the events after Katrina, one has to wonder about the nation's readiness to respond to such terrorist strikes.)

Wedged between the Mississippi River on the south and Lake Pontchartrain on the north, New Orleans is mostly below sea level, a saucer waiting to be filled. The "Big Easy" is a city of indolent charm, and its residents can be fatalist about enjoying the moment. The city, known for its "Cities of the Dead" because bodies must be buried aboveground, is somewhat otherworldly. It has long been better known for corruption than efficiency.

Over the years, hundreds of miles of earthen levees, concrete floodwalls and pumping stations have been built to keep out the water. Louisiana politicians have lobbied for more money to shore up and heighten the walls and to restore the entire Delta coastline. In June, Sen. Mary Landrieu brought 25 schoolkids into the French Quarter, put them in life jackets and had them stand on the beautiful old wrought-iron balconies. A blue tarp was draped below them to show how high the water would reach. That's almost how high the waternot blue, but brown with sewage, gas and chemicalsdid rise last week.

For years, the Army Corps of Engineers has asked for more money for New Orleans and not received it. The Bush administration, strapped by the war in Iraq and eager to hold down spending and cut taxes, actually reduced funding for bolstering the city's levees. Patchworked and aging, the levee system was originally built to withstand a Category 3 hurricane. With winds reaching 140 miles an hour, Katrina was a Category 4 storm when it hit New Orleans at dawn on Monday.

Incredibly, the hurricane could have been worse. It had grown to Category 5, with winds of 165 miles an hour, as it bore down on the Gulf Coast over the weekend. A hurricane is like a huge straw sucking up water, which creates a storm surge. The surge that hit the Gulf Coast, some 29 feet, was the highest ever recorded. The storm steered just to the east of New Orleans and blew away much of Biloxi, Miss. One Biloxi survivor, a Navy vet named Kevin Miller, described clinging to a tree as people floated by, "some dead." Miller told NEWSWEEK of grabbing a desperate woman by the hairand losing her. "I just lost my grip," he said, choking up. The suffering all along the Gulf Coast, where homes and whole islands vanished, has been terrible, with people's whole lives falling into ruin.

WEEK 5 (continued)

A poll taken for the "Hurricane Pam" planning exercise in 2004 predicted that, if ordered to evacuate New Orleans, about 30 percent of the city of a half-million people would stay behind. So it should have come as no surprise that some 80,000 to 100,000 people chose not to heed the order of Mayor Nagin to get out of town on the Saturday before the storm. A few stayed behind by choice. Brooke Duncan, who was "Rex, King of Carnival," at the 1971 Mardi Gras, wanted to remain in the city his family had first come to before the Civil War. But when the water began to lap at his house in the French Quarter, Duncan, 81, set out carrying his pet dog, a corgi, and a gun to a friend's house. He joined a convoy of well-off Garden District residents driving out of the city. "We had weapons and displayed them through the window," said Duncan, who is now in Cincinnati.

About a fifth of New Orleans residents live below the poverty line, and one in five does not have a car. This disadvantaged population is overwhelmingly African-American. The South has a sordid history when it comes to poor blacks and hurricanes. In 1927, when the Mississippi flooded, blacks were herded as virtual prisoners upriver in Greenville, Miss. As a steamboat, half-filled with whites, took off to safety, the band played "Bye-Bye, Blackbird." Racial tensions may have been even worse this time round. "I think the black population feels abandoned, and they were abandoned" in Katrina, says John M. Barry, author of "Rising Tide," a history of the Great Flood of 1927.

Those who were unable to leave New Orleans were told to go to the Superdome for safe haven from the storm. It quickly became the first circle of hell. First the air conditioning failed. Then the lights. A generator kicked in, but with only enough power to keep the huge arena dimly lit. (When the sun came out, it sent Biblical shafts through a couple of holes Katrina had blown in the roof.) The Salvation Army doled out thousands of ready-made meals (a choice of jambalaya, spaghetti or Thai chicken), but bottled water was scarce, and in the steamy heat, the stench of unwashed bodies ripened. On Wednesday, all running water shut off, and the reeking toilets overflowed.

In the dark bathrooms, the walls and floor were smeared with feces. A black market grew up. Hot sellers were cigarettes (at $10 a pack) and antidiuretics, to enable people to go longer without peeing. The occasional gunshot rang out. A man fell or jumped from the upper deck onto the concrete below and died. In a dank bathroom, someone attacked a National Guardsman with a lead pipe and tried to steal his automatic weapon. In the scuffle, the Guardsman was shot in the leg. Crack vials were scattered around the floor. At least two rapes were reported, one of a child.

At the adjoining and equally squalid New Orleans Arena, people began putting plastic bags on their feet to walk through the pools of urine. And yet, in a scene from Hieronymus Bosch, a man named Samuel Thompson, 34, took out his violin and played Bach's famous lamentation, Sonata No. 1 in G minor. He told L.A. Times reporter Scott Gold, who witnessed the scene, "These people have nothing. I have a violin. And I should play for them. They should have something."

Life went on, barely. On Monday night, in a dark attic surrounded by floodwater, Waldrica Nathan, 19, gave birth to a baby boy. The child was delivered by his father and grandparents, who had picked up a few tips by watching cable TV. The grandfather "knew just where to cut the cord and how to tie a shoestring around it," a hospital spokesman later told the New Orleans Times-Picayune. To keep the baby cool, family members fashioned a combination crib/boat out of a laundry basket and floated it in the cool waters of the flooded living room.

WEEK 5 (continued)

Throughout Tuesday and Wednesday, the water kept rising in New Orleans. The floodwalls breached in at least three places. Trying to plug one 300-foot gap on the 17th Street Canal, the Corps of Engineers dropped giant sandbags and concrete blocks from helicopters. But the choppers were called away to rescue people crying for help from rooftops, and the engineers were never able to get ahead of the flooding. As the water rose, New Orleans's Canal Street became a canal again. In a looted travel agency, some homeless men sat around eating potato chips and drinking Miller Lite beer.

Stranded residents became resourceful. People tore off chair legs and used them as torches after dark. Some people screamed as they waded by giant rats in the garbage-strewn water, but others improvised, making boats out of empty refrigerators. Rumors flew. There were alligators swimming in the ghetto. And sharks from the flooded aquarium downtown. Not truebut there were poisonous cottonmouth snakes and water moccasins.

The giant Wal-Mart store in the Lower Garden District stayed above the floodwaters and did a booming businessin freeloaders. Some people emerged with shopping carts full of food and water and medical supplies. Others appeared with TVs and DVDs. "Is everything free?" asked one woman arriving at the door. Told yes, she began chanting, "TV! TV! TV!" The looters took chain saws and fishing poles. One gang chased away the security guards and emptied the Wal-Mart of guns and ammunition, enough to arm a company of soldiers. The police themselves may have helped trigger the lawlessness, as reports that some of their own had engaged in looting swept through the city.

On Wednesday night, Mayor Nagin ordered 1,500 policemenvirtually the entire city forceto stop trying to rescue people from attics and rooftops, and to turn instead to stopping the looting. "They are starting to get to the heavily populated areashotels, hospitalsand we're going to stop it right now," he said.

By Thursday, New Orleans was on the verge of anarchy. Policemen, many of whom had lost their homes, were turning in their badges rather than face the looters for another day. Jail inmates were moved out of town, but their criminal records are underwater. Sorting out who has been charged and with which crime could be a nightmare. Shoplifters might be incarcerated with rapists, and the system might be compelled to let some suspects go free.

Mayor Nagin issued what he called a "desperate S.O.S." to the federal government. In a radio interview, he exploded at the Feds for holding "goddamn press conferences" instead of doing much to help his city. Nagin himself had problems of his own. He had opened up the Superdome to thousands of peoplebut nobody seemed to have had a plan to care for them or to get them out of there. There were promises of buses that never came. Some 500 National Guardsmen showed up to keep order, but the nervous young soldiers waved their weapons about. People began to complain that they were being held in a prison.

Washington, too, was slow to react to the crisis. The Pentagon, under Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, was reluctant for the military to take a lead role in disaster relief, a job traditionally performed by FEMA and by the National Guard, which is comm

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