In many organizations – from mid-sized to large scale facilities – managing a high volume of visitors presents operational, security, and safety challenges. One of the risk scenarios that need to be addressed for Health and Safety teams is including visitors in the emergency and evacuation procedures. Which means maintaining visibility of the visitor presence onsite and being able to locate and communicate with visitors in the case of an emergency.
According to OSHA, “A workplace emergency is an unforeseen situation that threatens your employees, customers, or the public; disrupts or shuts down your operations; or causes physical or environmental damage.”
For companies receiving dozens or even hundreds of visitors a day, if something were to occur, how would they immediately gather contact information for all visiting parties, identify which ones are presently on site, communicate an evacuation plan, and then confirm everyone’s safety with a roll call?
Even companies with advanced emergency communication protocols have struggled to implement a process that could effectively account for visitors and facilitate timely emergency communications. In reality, a combination of two technologies is needed to provide a comprehensive solution to visitor emergency procedures: visitor management and critical event management applications.
Sign In Enterprise has partnered with Everbridge to help customers leverage best-in-class technology for visitor emergency communication.
Including visitors in emergency protocols with Everbridge
Everbridge’s SaaS-based Critical Event Management platform quickly and reliably aggregates and assesses threat data, locates people at risk and allows responders to assist, automating the execution of pre-defined communications processes, and tracking progress on executing response plans.
Sign In Enterprise’s visitor management platform captures and manages visitor data that includes contact information, time on site, and enables multiple ways of visitor notifications and roll calls during emergency procedures.
Leveraging both Everbridge and Sign In Enterprise enables complete visibility of visitors, while adding the capability to immediately contact and alert guests with real-time emergency updates.
The goal for security managers is to mitigate risk and have policies and procedures in place for a multitude of events. Any environment where visitors are on site requires a proactive plan to manage the situation and roll out security procedures for both employees and visitors. The Sign In Enterprise solution paired with Everbridge is a great way to execute that.
Managing emergency preparedness at enterprise scale
A large number of Everbridge and Sign In Enterprise's customers are global entities with hundreds of sites and thousands of employees and visitors.
Enterprises, particularly in high-volume, complex environments, place a tremendous emphasis on safety and security of employees, facilities and guests. Dealing with multiple sites, different visitor types and employees requires a robust and flexible solution capable of adjusting to the needs of different locations.
Having a solution that simultaneously manages onsite visitors and employees saves critical time in emergency situations. It not only makes sure people are accounted for and briefed on emergency actions, but most importantly, it ensures they are safe.
When emergencies happen, environments are chaotic and there is a high pressure to act quickly. Preparedness and testing emergency scenarios is key to efficient emergency response and to ensuring safety of everyone involved. Making sure that visitors are a priority will reduce risk and eliminate blind spots in your operational procedures.