ISO 22330 “Guidelines for people aspects of business continuity” is here!
June 2018 sees the publication of the long awaited and much needed international standard ISO 22330 “Guidelines for people aspects of business continuity.” This new document expands on the guidance in ISO 22301 and ISO 22313 providing a uniform approach relevant to any size of organisation that needs to prepare for, and respond to, events that are disruptive, challenging or distressing for its people.
For too long, the focus has only been on the practicalities of restoring business operations whilst forgetting that people underpin the processes. People are the greatest asset in any business and it’s encouraging that their safety and well-being now warrants a standalone document. We were delighted to be involved in drawing up these guidelines and contributing to the management of the psychological aspects.
As well as business continuity, it will be of interest to people working in risk management, crisis response, human resources, health and welfare, leadership roles.
Although it is not a definitive guide to managing an incident, ISO 22330 does provide a useful starting point for considering where an organisation currently sits in its people response. It will be useful for considering blind spots – the things we don’t know that we don’t know – gaps in existing policies and processes, current strengths and areas for improvement and where it may necessary to bring in additional technical expertise.
ISO 22330 details recommendations across the phases of preparation, response, recovery and restoration. Two informative annexes focus on psychological response management and relatives’ response teams. The document is a good framework for creating policies and procedures and clear pathways of care for any size of organisation. Once they have identified the “what to do,” organisations can more effectively utilise existing internal resources and / or identify the areas of external expertise required to implement the “how to do it.”
The first Annex, along with the clear definitions at the beginning of the document, provide concrete advice on steps that can be taken to provide a continuum of care. It emphasises 2 clinically effective, immediate actions that all organisations should be taking after a crisis or potentially traumatic event: providing psychological education and workplace support. Psychological education normalises responses and empowers people to become active in their own recovery. Workplace support can vary from the basic, humane care that we would want to offer and receive to trained peer supporters. Managers and supervisors often want to do the right thing but don’t know what this is and for many lower risk profile organisations, training peer supporters is simply not an appropriate option.
KRTS International developed a ground-breaking App to allow organisations to provide psychological education and workplace support immediately after an incident in a simple, global but cost-effective way. It is the first intervention on a needs-based continuum care and for the majority of people will be enough. This allows resources to be targeted where they are needed most. For more information on the App, go to
You can find more information on our services for assessing risk and training employees or peer supporters on our website.
For a preview of ISO 22330 go to https://www.iso.org/obp/ui/#iso:std:iso:ts:22330:ed-1:v1:en