Business Continuity Planning and Crisis Response Training Course

Duration 5 days 10 modules · 33 contact hours
Level Intermediate Certificate on completion
Who attends Business Continuity Managers, Risk Managers and others
Fee from USD 1,100 KSh 95,000 for Kenyan organisations
Where 52 cities + online See dates by city
Next start 9 Nov 2026 Course code SD-BC-024

Before you join: Participants should understand their organisation's main products, services, operational processes and reporting structure.

Dates & prices

Two start dates a month in every city, and live online on weekdays or weekends. Fees are per participant; classroom fees include tuition, materials, lunch and refreshments, and the certificate.

Suggest a date or city

Showing the next six months. Later dates, other cities and private deliveries for your team are available on request.

Course overview

Disruptions can stop essential services within minutes: a ransomware event can disable payment processing, a utility outage can close a hospital department, a supplier failure can halt manufacturing, and civil unrest can restrict access to sites. Organisations need more than emergency procedures. They need a tested business continuity management system that identifies priority activities, sets recovery targets, assigns decision authority and sustains service while normal operations are restored.

This course develops the practical knowledge required to design, maintain and improve business continuity arrangements. Participants work through ISO 22301 business continuity management system requirements, business impact analysis, threat-based risk assessment, recovery time objectives, continuity strategies, plan architecture and exercise programmes. The course also addresses crisis leadership, situation reporting, stakeholder communications, IT disaster recovery coordination, third-party dependencies and corrective action management. Participants learn to distinguish emergency response, crisis management, business continuity and disaster recovery, then connect them through clear governance and escalation arrangements.

Teaching combines short instructor briefings with sector-based cases, group analysis, plan reviews, tabletop scenarios and crisis-response simulations. Cases may reflect banking payment outages, healthcare service disruption, cyber incidents, public-sector emergencies and supplier interruptions. Each participant leaves with a structured continuity planning pack containing reusable templates, a business impact analysis model, recovery strategy options, crisis-response tools and a personal implementation plan. Successful participants receive a certificate of completion.

The course is suited to managers and specialists responsible for continuity planning, operational resilience, emergency preparedness, risk, security, IT recovery, facilities or critical supplier management. It is particularly useful for teams that need to turn existing policies into usable plans, improve weak exercise results or prepare for assurance reviews.

What you will be able to do

  • Conduct a business impact analysis using recovery objectives, dependencies and minimum service levels
  • Assess disruption scenarios using likelihood, impact, velocity and control effectiveness criteria
  • Design continuity strategies for people, facilities, technology, suppliers and critical activities
  • Draft business continuity plan components with activation criteria, action cards and escalation routes
  • Apply ISO 22361 crisis-management principles to initial assessment, decision-making and situation reporting
  • Prepare stakeholder communications using message maps, notification schedules and spokesperson protocols
  • Plan continuity exercises using tabletop, walkthrough and simulation methods
  • Establish a continuity maintenance programme using corrective actions, audits and management review

Benefits of attending

For you

  • Ability to lead structured business impact analysis interviews
  • Confidence setting recovery time and recovery point objectives
  • Practical crisis coordination and situation-reporting skills
  • Reusable methods for testing plans and tracking corrective actions
  • Stronger contribution to continuity audits, assurance reviews and management meetings

For your organisation

  • Clearer priorities for restoring critical products, services and processes
  • Documented recovery targets aligned with operational and customer commitments
  • Faster, more consistent escalation during disruptive incidents
  • Better coordination between operations, IT, facilities, suppliers and leadership
  • Evidence-based continuity improvement through exercises, audits and corrective actions

Course modules

10 modules over 5 days

Participants can explain business continuity management components and establish appropriate governance arrangements.

  • ISO 22301 clauses translated into an operational continuity management system
  • Governance roles defined through policy, programme, ownership and assurance
  • Distinguishing resilience, emergency response, crisis management, continuity and disaster recovery
  • Three lines model applied to continuity oversight and accountability
  • Risk appetite statements linked to disruption tolerances and decision rights
  • Legal, contractual and regulatory continuity obligations mapped to controls

Participants can assess disruption scenarios and identify priority risks requiring continuity treatment.

  • Scenario-based risk assessment using likelihood, impact, velocity and control effectiveness
  • Bow-tie analysis connecting threats, preventive controls, recovery controls and consequences
  • Threat registers cover cyberattack, utility loss, pandemic, supplier failure and civil unrest
  • Interdependencies traced across sites, people, technology, suppliers and critical services
  • Maximum tolerable period of disruption established for priority activities
  • Risk treatment options documented using avoid, reduce, transfer and accept decisions

Participants can conduct a business impact analysis and define defensible recovery requirements.

  • Business impact analysis scope defines products, services, processes and locations
  • Critical activity interviews capture dependencies, peak periods and manual workarounds
  • Recovery time objectives derived from maximum tolerable periods of disruption
  • Recovery point objectives set for data loss tolerance and restoration
  • Minimum business continuity objective specifies acceptable service during recovery
  • Resource requirements quantify people, facilities, technology, information and suppliers

Participants can select continuity strategies that meet agreed recovery objectives and constraints.

  • Continuity strategies compared using cost, recovery capability, feasibility and residual risk
  • Work area recovery options include remote work, reciprocal sites and alternate facilities
  • Technology recovery considers backups, replication, failover, cloud services and manual processing
  • Supplier continuity requirements embedded in contracts, service levels and exit plans
  • People strategies address succession, cross-training, welfare, transport and communications
  • Selected strategies documented against recovery objectives and required resources

Participants can structure usable continuity plans with clear activation and recovery procedures.

  • Plan architecture aligns incident, crisis, continuity and recovery procedures
  • Activation criteria distinguish local incidents from enterprise continuity events
  • Command structures assign incident commander, crisis lead, liaison and communications roles
  • Action cards provide role-specific checklists, authorities, contacts and escalation triggers
  • Call-tree procedures account for acknowledgement, escalation, alternates and message logs
  • Plan assumptions, dependencies and constraints recorded for controlled use

Participants can coordinate initial crisis response using structured command, assessment and reporting methods.

  • ISO 22361 principles guide crisis leadership, sense-making and strategic decisions
  • Initial crisis assessment establishes facts, impacts, priorities and information gaps
  • Gold-silver-bronze coordination model clarifies strategic, tactical and operational command
  • Decision logs capture rationale, authority, timing, actions and outstanding issues
  • Situation reports use agreed reporting periods, status indicators and forecasts
  • Escalation thresholds trigger executive involvement, regulator notification and external support

Participants can prepare timely, controlled communications for internal and external stakeholders.

  • Stakeholder mapping prioritises employees, customers, regulators, suppliers and communities
  • Message maps organise confirmed facts, protective actions, empathy and next updates
  • Spokesperson protocols control approvals, media statements, interviews and social media
  • Employee communications address safety, work instructions, welfare and reporting channels
  • Regulatory notifications scheduled against sector rules, materiality thresholds and deadlines
  • Rumour management monitors misinformation, corrects false claims and preserves evidence

Participants can align technology recovery activities with business continuity priorities.

  • IT disaster recovery scope distinguishes applications, infrastructure, data and end-user services
  • Recovery tiers align system criticality with recovery time and recovery point objectives
  • Backup strategies assess immutability, retention, restoration testing and offsite storage
  • Cyber incident playbooks coordinate containment, forensic preservation, recovery and communications
  • Manual workarounds maintain essential transactions when systems remain unavailable
  • Third-party technology dependencies tested through service restoration commitments

Participants can plan exercises and convert findings into accountable improvement actions.

  • Exercise objectives derive from plan risks, assumptions and recovery priorities
  • Tabletop exercises test decisions, communications, escalation and role understanding
  • Simulation injects challenge information management, resource allocation and coordination
  • Walkthroughs validate procedures, contacts, facilities and technical recovery sequences
  • After-action reviews separate observations, root causes, corrective actions and owners
  • Corrective action registers set deadlines, evidence requirements and closure verification

Participants can maintain continuity arrangements through change control, assurance and planned improvement.

  • Continuity management cycle applies plan-do-check-act to programme maintenance
  • Change triggers include acquisitions, system releases, relocations and supplier changes
  • Key performance indicators track exercise completion, actions, training and plan currency
  • Internal audit tests conformity against ISO 22301 requirements and documented controls
  • Management review considers performance, incidents, resources, risks and improvement opportunities
  • Personal application plan schedules priority continuity improvements and stakeholder commitments

Exercises and examples are adapted to each cohort's sectors and roles.

What you take back to work

  1. Business impact analysis interview template
  2. Recovery objectives and dependency mapping model
  3. Continuity strategy selection matrix
  4. Business continuity plan and action-card template
  5. Crisis situation report and decision-log pack
  6. Exercise and corrective-action tracker

Who should attend

  • Business Continuity Managers — responsible for building, updating or testing continuity arrangements
  • Risk Managers — need to connect operational risks with recovery priorities and treatment actions
  • Crisis Management Team Members — require clear roles, escalation methods and decision records
  • IT Service Continuity Managers — coordinate technology recovery with business recovery requirements
  • Health, Safety and Security Managers — link emergency response arrangements to service continuity
  • Operations and Facilities Managers — protect critical processes, sites, people and supplier dependencies

Skills and tools covered

Business impact analysisContinuity strategy designCrisis coordinationRecovery objective settingExercise managementContinuity governance

Tools and standards

ISO 22301, ISO 22361, ISO 22317, Bow-tie analysis

How the course runs

Training methodology

The course uses short instructor briefings to introduce standards, methods and planning decisions, followed by case work drawn from operational disruption scenarios. Participants analyse business impacts, select recovery strategies, review plan components and practise crisis-team decisions through facilitated tabletop simulations. Group exercises focus on dependencies, communications, escalation and corrective actions rather than theoretical discussion. Trainers provide structured feedback and allow time for participants to adapt the methods to their own responsibilities through individual application planning.

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should understand their organisation's main products, services, operational processes and reporting structure. Experience in operations, risk, health and safety, security, IT, facilities, procurement or emergency planning is useful. Participants will benefit from bringing a general awareness of their current incident or continuity arrangements, although this is not essential. No prior certification in business continuity, ISO management systems, audit, crisis management or IT disaster recovery is required. The course does not assume specialist cyber, legal or technical recovery knowledge.

A typical training day

08:30 – 10:30First session
10:30 – 10:45Refreshment break
10:45 – 12:30Second session
12:30 – 13:30Lunch and networking
13:30 – 15:00Third session
15:00 – 15:15Refreshment break
15:15 – 16:30Workshop and daily review

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in East Africa Time, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

  • Instruction by a practitioner facilitator
  • Full course workbook and materials
  • Exercise files, templates and case studies
  • Refreshments and lunch on classroom deliveries
  • Certificate of completion
  • Post-course application plan

Frequently asked questions

You should understand your organisation's main operations and reporting structure. Prior continuity, crisis management or ISO experience is useful but not required.

Bring examples of your organisation's continuity policy, incident procedures, business impact analysis, recovery plans or exercise reports if you can share them appropriately. You can still participate fully without organisational documents.

It suits continuity, risk, operations, IT recovery, facilities, security and health and safety professionals. It also helps members of crisis management teams who need a shared response method.

Emergency response focuses on immediate life safety and incident control, while IT disaster recovery focuses on restoring technology. This course connects those disciplines to maintain priority business services, coordinate crisis decisions and restore normal operations.

You can use the templates to improve a business impact analysis, define recovery objectives, revise action cards or plan an exercise. The final application plan helps identify practical actions for your role and stakeholders.

The five-day programme provides about 32.5 contact hours, normally from 08:30 to 16:30 each day. Time is divided between instructor input, cases, group work, plan analysis, tabletop scenarios and implementation planning.

Questions about this course?

Ask about dates, fees, group bookings or running it for your team. Our training team replies by email.

Ask on WhatsApp info@skillsetdevelopment.com

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