This emergency preparedness checklist can help you ready your workplace and workers for a wide range of emergencies and maintain business continuity.

What are the most likely threats to your workplace?
Severe weather/natural disasters (such as ice storms, earthquakes, floods)?
 Yes No
Communicable disease outbreaks (such as SARS, pandemic influenza)?
 Yes No
Interruption of essential services, such as power, water, mail, public transit and communications?
 Yes No
Damage to facilities (such as fire, water damage)?
 Yes No
Computer failures (such as loss of data, cyber-attacks)?
 Yes No
Labour issues (such as strikes, unsafe work environments, violence)?
 Yes No
Proximity to railways & freeways, which could expose the workplace to chemical spills, dangerous goods?
 Yes No
Terrorism (such as the use of anthrax, explosive devices)?
 Yes No
Radiological/nuclear hazards (such as exposures, reactor incidents)?
 Yes No

What functions or services are critical to maintaining your workplace? 
Have you prioritized functions that are critical to the continuation of your business?
 Yes No
Are there other ways of maintaining those functions in the event of a loss of key people, facilities, tools or technology?
 Yes No
Have you identified key partnerships upon which your business depends, such as shipping services, technology support, supply of raw materials, etc.?
 Yes No
Does your workplace have effective health and safety programs?
 Yes No

What is the chain of command in the event of an emergency?
Have you identified the person in charge of emergency preparedness and a back-up person? Who implements, maintains and oversees the plan?
 Yes No
Have you outlined a chain of command with alternates and communicated this clearly to workers?
 Yes No
Have you considered how workers will be notified of an emergency and created a contact plan?
 Yes No
Do you have an emergency info-line where workers can access information quickly, such as whether or not they should come to work that day?
 Yes No
Have you considered cross training workers, especially for critical business, emergency, and health and safety functions?
 Yes No

What is the emergency response plan for your workplace?
Have you created an emergency response plan? If half of your workers were affected by a serious communicable disease how would your workplace continue to operate?
 Yes No
Does your emergency plan include initial response but also address longer-term issues that may arise?
 Yes No
Is there a regular review process to ensure that the plan remains current?
 Yes No
Have there been practice sessions to identify possible gaps in the plan?
 Yes No

Consider the following questions and how they relate to your workplace:

People
Does your emergency preparedness plan provide for public health emergencies, such as SARS or pandemic influenza?
 Yes No
Does your benefit plan pay for sick time? Do you encourage workers to stay home or work from home when they’re sick?
 Yes No
If some of your workers were quarantined, could they work from home? What are their rights?
 Yes No
Are counselling services provided for workers and their families to promote healthy coping strategies, combat posttraumatic stress and allow for constructive debriefing from a crisis?
 Yes No
Are there provisions in the plan to ensure the safety and security of the families of your workers?
 Yes No
Have you considered the unique needs of different cultural groups in the workplace in emergency situations?
 Yes No
Are workers encouraged to create their own emergency preparedness plans for their home and family? For example if the schools closed due to a public emergency, what alternate childcare arrangements have been made?
 Yes No
If a worker develops a communicable disease, are the other workers entitled to know about it? How do you protect the privacy of your workers while also protecting the safety of your staff?
 Yes No
Does your company have a hand-hygiene policy?

 Yes No
Does your business have a first aid kit that’s readily accessible and personnel that are trained in first aid?
 Yes No
Does your company offer flu vaccination clinics each year and actively encourage workers to participate?
 Yes No
Does your workplace have an evacuation plan? Is it practiced and reviewed on a regular basis?
 Yes No

Key Business Functions
Does your business insurance policy have business interruption coverage? If so, does it cover lost profit or just overhead?
 Yes No
Does your business have a clear succession plan? If key people died in an emergency, who would take their places?
 Yes No
If some of your workers were quarantined, could they work from home? What are their rights?
 Yes No
Are counselling services provided for workers and their families to promote healthy coping strategies, combat posttraumatic stress and allow for constructive debriefing from a crisis?
 Yes No
Are there provisions in the plan to ensure the safety and security of the families of your workers?
 Yes No

Facilities
Does your company maintain an alternate site where business can quickly be resumed if the primary site were unexpectedly unavailable? If so, is this site within the same city or would workers have to temporarily relocate? If workers are expected to relocate to this site, have you considered their families?
 Yes No
Does your business routinely review fire code regulations to be sure that equipment and evacuation plans are current?
 Yes No
Does your business routinely update its insurance policies?
 Yes No
Have you considered the security of the physical work environment?
 Yes No
Are hand-hygiene stations or facilities easily accessible to staff and clients?
 Yes No
Are worker workspaces, break rooms and washroom facilities regularly cleaned and disinfected?
 Yes No
Does your business run regular maintenance checks, and service or repair air filtration systems, plumbing, water leaks, etc. as needed? Do you keep accurate records of these repairs and maintenance activities?
 Yes No
Does your business maintain and routinely check a general-purpose emergency preparedness kit?
 Yes No