Creating a Crisis Decision Matrix, by Steve N.

It’s been said, “It takes a village to raise a child”. While I do not agree with much of anything else Hillary says, that was certainly true in my case. My upbringing consisted of guidance and council from a rather diverse group of individuals, a large segment of whom were 1970s-era survivalists, (How many of you remember Mel Tappan’s “Personal Survival Letter”?). These were self-sufficient, hard-money, common sense, salt-of-the-earth type people. A few even had underground bunkers, (I mean “root cellars”). Given the mind set of my mentors, you might assume that I’m all stocked up on beans, bullets, and band aids. Regrettably, I am not as well prepared as I should be. As I analyzed why this is so, I was forced to admit that I had fallen prey to a fault that could prove to be uncomfortable or even fatal, if not corrected. Please bear with me as I illustrate with personal experience.

I was raised in rural America, and have hundreds of hours in canoes. One clear October morning, my friend and I took a hankering for some fresh trout, and we knew of a lake a couple of hours paddle downstream from his house. October is nigh winter in the North, and we figured since the bugs had been frozen out for a week or so, the trout would be ravenous.
We arrived at the lake after a leisurely downstream paddle, and were delighted to find only half the lake’s surface in winter’s early grasp. Our strategy was simple, we would cast our lures onto the edge of the ice, reel them back ever so slowly, until they slipped into the water with hardly a ripple. With such a quiet entry, the unsuspecting trout were inhaling our spinners. We sure had it our way; no bugs, no bears, no tourists, and the fishing was hot! In my mind’s eye, I could see my wife’s beaming smile, she loves fresh trout.

Then, while netting another candidate for the skillet, my friend leaned over a bit too far. The canoe tilted and several gallons of water poured over the side. My fast-thinking (but clumsy) friend, realizing that he was going to capsize us completely, rolled over the side, into the lake. The canoe righted itself but, all the water that had poured over the side seconds earlier, now ran to my end of the canoe. The combination of my body weight plus several gallons of water was enough to submerge my end, and water poured over the bow into my lap. Having no recourse, I (gracefully) floated out of the swamped canoe, into the lake. We stayed with the canoe, and kicked our way towards shore, however, the closest “shore” in this case was a raft of muskeg several yards away. (Muskeg is a thick mat of vegetation so dense it floats, common in the North country).We clawed our way onto the muskeg, and it immediately started to sink beneath our weight, so once again the water came pouring in. Everything reached equilibrium and we stopped sinking at about knee deep, so we stripped down and wrung out our clothes, dumped the canoe out and headed for home. The upstream paddle was a blessing in disguise because the hard work kept us relatively warm.

We made it back, and even managed to save the fish. And yes, my wife did beam a brilliant smile; she loves fresh trout you know. But legend has it that, every October, the animals gather at lakeside. They tell a tale of a couple of hapless fisherman, who stood on the edge of the muskeg, naked to the waist, knee deep in icy water, hyper-ventilating while they wrung the water out of their clothes, and then disappeared upstream, never to be seen again.

My point is simply this, through no fault of my own; my situation had deteriorated from relatively pleasant to a little chilly, and a lot life-threatening. Never before, or since, have I been unintentionally thrown from a canoe. Just that once… but that’s all it takes, right? “Just that once”. I suspect you and I are a lot alike. Despite our experience, (remember my “village”), we keep living our lives as though the “canoe is never going to tip”. It’s called denial.

The people who study the psychology of survivors, tell us that the mental progression in wilderness survival situations is similar to that of someone who has just received some disastrous news. Countless situations have devolved from rescues to recoveries because the participants refuse to acknowledge that they were in a dangerous situation. The survivors are the ones who get through the denial stage the fastest. The don’t waste a lot of energy wondering “Why has this happened to me?”. They get over it, and get on with the business of surviving.
The preparedness process can seem overwhelming at times. There are so many necessities that, deciding where to commit time and/or resources can be disquieting. The truth is, its way easier and cheaper to stay in denial, because after all, the canoe is never going to tip, right? To help get you off high center, I’d like to offer a decision making matrix; a method to help you decide where to expend your time and resources to your best advantage.

Industry has developed a procedure called “Process Hazard Analysis”. If you’re responsible for the safe operation of a facility of some kind, you gather your engineers, technicians and operators together and discuss the risks involved in running your plant. Big picture it works like this; you pick an event, and rank how likely it is to happen, the severity of the consequences if it did, and any safeguards in place to prevent that particular event from happening. With this prioritized list you are able to see where to put your maximum effort. If you’ve never had the joy of sitting through this procedure… I’d suggest a mid-October swim instead. But, if you think of an “event” as a condition that produces an undesirable result, then you can see how we can apply this process to our preparedness efforts.

Make 6 columns down a piece of paper. Title the first “category/event”, the second “Likelihood”, the third “Consequences”. “Safeguards”, “Total” and “Action” are the titles for columns 4, 5, and 6.
The rankings for the “likelihood” and “severity” columns will be 1 through 5, with 1 representing “highly unlikely” (for likelihood) and “Insignificant” (for consequences), 3 representing “Probable” and “Serious but Repairable”, and 5 representing “Highly Probable” and “Financial Ruin/Fatality”. (I’ll include a complete list of the rankings I use in an appendix at the end of this article).

So, for example, if I picked a category of “Civil Unrest” and an event of “Riots”, my thought process would go like this: There has never been a riot in my hometown and it’s very unlikely there ever will be, so “Likelihood” would get a rank of 1. I live a ways out of town so, even if there was a riot in town, it’s very doubtful that it would spread to my place, so “Consequences” gets a 1. I have locks and an alarm system and a big dog, so I’m “Confident” in my safeguards, I’ll give them a 3. You can see that I don’t need to spend a lot of resources preparing for riots. On the other hand, you may live in a neighborhood that has experienced nearby riots. You rankings would come out different and perhaps indicate that you should spend some time thinking about how to mitigate that risk. Note however, that a category of “Civil Unrest” with and event of “Burglary” would rank higher in my situation, because that particular event has happened in my area.

Had I chosen a category of “Natural Disasters” and an Event of “Forest Fire”, my likelihood rank would be 5 (because forest fires have occurred in my area). The consequence rank would be 5, because the worst case consequence is a fatality. My safeguards, (detectors, and extinguishers) are adequate but could use improvement, so safeguards get a 2. Add column 2 (likelihood) and 3 (severity) and subtract column 4 (safeguards) and I have a total of 8 out of a possible 10, a high priority. You can see through this extreme example that, it makes more sense for me to focus my efforts on upgrading my fire plan, than it does preparing for a riot. I should probably place a higher priority on fire extinguishers than firearms, hard to do given the emotion of today’s situation. Examination of your situation may well result in a different conclusion. The important thing is that emotion is removed from the decision making process.

We all have a tendency to “lock up” when faced with an intimidating task. It is my hope that, by introducing this decision making process, you can remove the paralyzing emotions from the decisions that must be made. By thoughtfully following the process, you’ll create a touchstone that will anchor you when self-doubt or well-meaning friends criticize your actions, and you are tempted to procrastinate or worse. If your beliefs don’t impact your actions then they’re just worthless mental baggage. How many times have you heard the word “unprecedented” lately? That means that we have never been in this situation before, not in all of mankind’s history. So we really have no idea how this will end. There is still time to act, the canoe hasn’t tipped yet. Use this matrix to assess where you are in the preparedness process and, most importantly, act on your decisions.

Suggested Definitions of Rankings

Likelihood
1. Has not happened to you, or in your local area
2. Improbable, unlikely
3. Possible
4. Probable, likely
5. Has happened to you or in your local area.

Severity
1. No significant consequence
2. Disagreeable, minor physical/financial loss
3. Significant but repairable
4. Major injury, financial hardship
5. Financial ruin, fatality

Safeguards
1. None
2. Low confidence, needs improvement
3. Confident, has been adequate
4. Extremely confident
5. Absolute confidence

Add the Likelihood and Severity numbers, and subtract from that the safeguard number for a personalized risk ranking of a specific event.
You can see that, events with high likelihood, severe consequences and low safeguards are going to require action, say any event with a total risk ranking of 8 or more. Total risk of 5-7 deserves some serious consideration. Total risks of less than 4 are low priorities. If you decide an event requires action, it may be possible to add safeguard points, and diminish the risk, with simple lifestyle changes before committing resources that could be better used elsewhere.

The following is an example of a Crisis Decision Matrix. (Modify to fit your particular situation.)