What will never change in the workplace is that emergencies and disasters could always be a possibility. This then means that employers, managers and employees constantly need to be vigilant when it comes to detecting, reacting and communicating during crisis situations.
What does change year after year are the trends that impact how companies prepare to emergencies and disasters. Tools such as the alert notification system evolves and changes.
As technology and industry evolve, here are some of the emergency communication trends you will need to watch out for in the coming years:
1. Interoperable Cross-Organizational Collaboration
When emergencies are widespread and large in scale, communication between companies and first responders becomes difficult and challenging. This has given a lot of attention to cross-agency collaboration on the federal level. Due to this evolution, federal agencies are looking into producing systems, such as an alert notification system, and networks that allow for a higher level of interoperable communication when emergencies occur.
More organizations will take what federal agencies have produced into consideration, and industries will deploy systems that allow for simplication of communication with community groups during emergencies. Not only will this ensure that vital information reach the proper authorities, it will enable organizations to send messages that contain more than text. As the alert notification system becomes more commonplace, messages will be more versatile, containing photos, videos, and geolocation information that will allow the sharing of messages with more complete context. The more information first responders and authorities receive, the better and faster they are at making decisions during a crisis.
2. International Alerting Capabilities
Businesses today are part of a global economy. Everyday operations involve cultural and language barriers because workplaces have become more diverse. While work environments develop channels to help employees from different backgrounds cope with the work they do and the company they work for, emergencies are not able to provide the same opportunity and time as these initiatives do.
In order to make sure that the alerts sent through an alert notification system are clear and understandable, the administration of notifications should be improved. One way of doing this is to allow users the option of selecting their desired language when it comes to receiving notifications. Also, senders will have the option of selecting languages for delivery, allowing for the whole alerting experience to be customizable according to the language of the sender and/or receiver.
3. Integration with Devices
A game changer nowadays is the so-called Internet of Things (IoT). The multitude of devices now networked together aid in connecting people more than ever. This makes communication more convenient and accessible, but also makes emergency communication a matter of life and death. More devices means more ways to communicate, but it also creates confusion when it comes to which devices should be reached and which devices are connected to each other.
Centralization when it comes to communication becomes challenging, but when done successfully, centrally controlled communications allows for the simultaneous delivery of messages to various platforms. Aside from the typical messages send to devices which are connected to networks, many of them can also include sensors which relay further information, such as heart monitors and phone cameras.
We will see in the next coming years more of a push when it comes to unifying alerting systems and activities across different devices. More organizations will invest in systems which allow staff members to receive messages through their desktop wallpapers, phones, and others. Alerts are tailor-made specifically for the business and the needs of the workforce. Customized messages allow staff members to be informed as soon as possible in the devices they utilize the most.
