Business Continuity Exercise
A one-hour tabletop exercise page helps service owners rehearse how a critical service could continue during disruption. Use its timed agenda, fictional scenario, role prompts, and learning-action record to leave with clear follow-ups.
Every employee gets a seat — priced per employee in Communications & Intranet, quoted with this template ready.
Rolled out to every employee at AutoZone (125,000), PetSmart (50,000+), A.S. Watson and Raley's (20,000) — and at larger retailers we are not permitted to name.
Built for: Food distribution · Manufacturing and supply chain · Customer support operations · Wholesale and retail operations
Overview
The Business Continuity Exercise is a facilitator-led page for a one-hour tabletop discussion about keeping a critical service going through a disruption. Its fictional Northwind Provisions example follows a regional order-support service when the shared workspace used to receive, track, and assign urgent requests becomes unavailable. The page gives the group a timed agenda, scenario and scope prompts, an essential-activities example, a role exercise with sample dialogue, and a learning-action record.
Use it when a service owner needs to bring dependent roles together and expose assumptions about priorities, decisions, and handoffs without changing systems or contacting customers. The agenda moves from framing the scenario to mapping essential activities, rehearsing role decisions, and capturing three to five follow-up actions. Participants are prompted to distinguish the work that must continue—such as receiving urgent requests and assigning an owner—from the usual tool used to do it. This keeps the discussion focused on service needs rather than jumping straight to a technical fix.
Before the session, adapt the scenario to the service and identify which roles should attend. Keep the exercise within its stated boundary: questions about real system changes, customer messages, or safety-critical procedures become learning actions for the appropriate owner. This page is not a live incident procedure, an approved fallback plan, or proof that a continuity control works. Do not use it in place of the organization's active incident communication route or formal continuity process; move approved actions into the organization's designated tracking method.
Standards & compliance context
- Treat the page as an exercise aid, not evidence that a continuity plan, control, or regulatory obligation has been satisfied.
- Confirm applicable continuity, safety, privacy, and sector requirements with the organization's responsible owners; the fictional Northwind scenario does not establish local applicability.
- Keep actual customer information and sensitive operational details out of the sample page unless the organization's approved handling rules permit their use.
- Use clear headings, readable table labels, and accessible color contrast when adapting the page, consistent with WCAG 2.1 AA accessibility practices.
General regulatory context for orientation only — verify current requirements with counsel or the relevant agency before relying on this template for compliance.
What's inside this template
Rehearse how a critical service keeps going
Use this opening to establish that the page guides a discussion exercise, not a live incident response.
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This one-hour tabletop exercise helps a service owner and the teams around them talk through a disruption before one happens. You discuss decisions and handoffs. You change no systems and contact no customers. The worked example follows Northwind Provisions, a fictional company, and its regional order-support service. If a real incident is under way, use your organization's active incident communication route, not this page.
60-minute agenda
The timeboxes help the facilitator move from scenario framing to decisions and recorded actions within one session.
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Authored example agenda for a facilitator, not a live schedule. Adjust the timings to your group. Time Activity Output 0:00–0:05 Frame the scenario and the exercise boundary Everyone can state the scenario and what is out of scope 0:05–0:20 Map essential activities and their dependencies A short list of what must continue, what can wait, and who depends on whom 0:20–0:45 Rehearse role decisions and handoffs The first decision each role needs from another team, and who makes it 0:45–1:00 Capture learning actions Three to five actions, each with a responsible role and a follow-up point
Scenario and scope
This fictional order-support outage gives participants a shared situation and makes the exercise boundary explicit.
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Read this aloud to open the session, then use the prompts to settle the boundary. The scenario It is the last Thursday of the month, Northwind's busiest week for urgent orders. The shared workspace the order-support team normally uses to receive, track and assign requests becomes unavailable at 9:30 and is not expected back until the next day. The service in focus Regional order support: receiving urgent customer requests, assigning each to an owner, and passing work to warehouse and billing teams. Who is affected Order support, the warehouse dispatch team, billing, and the customer-team liaisons who speak to enterprise customers every day. Ask the room which other teams belong on this list. In scope Discussing continuity options, dependencies, priorities and who needs to decide what. Out of scope Changing any real system, contacting real customers, or testing safety-critical procedures. Park those questions for the learning actions. Prompts to settle before you start Which service priority matters most today? What do you need to know in the first 30 minutes before you can choose a response? Who would you expect to hear from, and who would expect to hear from you?
Essential activities versus preferred ways of working
Separating the work that must continue from the usual tool helps the group reason about dependencies without assuming an unapproved fallback.
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Work through the sample with the group, then repeat it for your own service. Essential: receive urgent requests Customers still need a way to raise something urgent, and someone still needs to see it within the working day. Ask: where could a request arrive if the usual workspace is down? Ask: who checks that channel, and how often? Essential: assign an owner to every urgent request An urgent request with no named owner is the first thing to fall between teams. Ask: how do we record who owns what without the shared view? Ask: who can reassign if the owner is unavailable? Preferred method: the shared workspace The workspace is how the team normally does the two activities above. It is not the activity itself, so the group can discuss alternatives and what can be deferred, such as routine status updates and weekly reporting. Ask: which dependencies, such as dispatch or billing, need the information in the same form? Ask: what can wait until the workspace returns?
Run the role exercise
These prompts help each role surface its first decision, information needs, and handoffs as the scenario develops.
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Three fictional roles take part: service owner, request coordinator and customer-team liaison. Add your own roles as needed. Open the scenario Read the scenario aloud and give each role two minutes to note its own first concern. Facilitator prompt: "The workspace is unavailable. What is the first decision your role needs from another team?" Take it role by role Each role states what it would do first, what it needs to know, and who it would contact. Example: the request coordinator says, "I need the service owner to confirm which fallback channel we are using before I can tell dispatch." Add a timed update After about 10 minutes, announce: "It is now 11:00 and three urgent requests have arrived by phone." Ask each role what changes, and who knows about the three requests. Review the handoffs Ask each pair of roles: "What did you pass to them, in what form, and how would you know they had received it?" Note every handoff that depended on the unavailable workspace. Stop at the boundary If the discussion turns to fixing a real system or drafting customer messages, note it as a learning action and bring the group back to the scenario.
Record learning actions
The action prompts turn observations into follow-ups with a responsible role, dependencies, and a review point.
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Each participant keeps notes using these five prompts. Nothing here is submitted or assigned automatically. Observation What did the exercise show? Write what you saw, not who was at fault. Proposed action One concrete thing that would help, small enough to describe in a sentence. Responsible role A role, not a person, so the action survives team changes. Decision or dependency needed What must another team decide or provide before the action can move? Follow-up point When the group will check progress, for example the next monthly service review. Worked example Observation: urgent requests have no shared view when the workspace is down. Action: assess an agreed fallback record. Role: service owner, with the customer-team liaison. Needs: agreement on who can see the record. Follow-up: next service review. Observable: the group can check whether a fallback record exists Names a role and a follow-up point
How to use this template
- Select a service, adapt the fictional disruption to a plausible scenario, and confirm the exercise boundary, including what the group must not test or change.
- Invite the service owner, facilitator, people who perform the essential activities, and representatives of dependent teams such as dispatch or billing.
- Read the scenario and scope aloud, then follow the 60-minute agenda to identify essential activities, dependencies, priorities, and work that can wait.
- Run the role exercise by asking each participant what decision they need, what they would do first, and what information they must hand to another role.
- Use the timed update and handoff review to expose assumptions, then capture each observation as a concrete action with a responsible role, dependency, and follow-up point.
- Review the notes with the service owner, transfer approved actions into the designated tracking process, and route live-incident or safety-critical issues to the appropriate established procedure.
Best practices
- Name the service and disruption in plain language before inviting participants so attendees can recognize the work being exercised.
- Write down the exercise boundary at the outset and redirect system changes, real customer contact, and safety-critical testing into learning actions.
- Ask participants to describe the essential activity separately from the tool or channel they normally use to perform it.
- Invite every team that receives, supplies, or depends on a handoff, and ask the room whether any affected role is missing.
- Use role names rather than employee names in exercise notes so ownership remains usable through staff changes.
- Record handoffs in observable terms: what information moves, who sends it, who receives it, and how receipt would be confirmed.
- Keep proposed fallback channels clearly labeled as discussion options until the proper owner has approved them.
- Assign each learning action a responsible role, any required decision or dependency, and a specific follow-up point.
What this template typically catches
Issues teams running this template most often surface in practice:
Common use cases
Frequently asked questions
What does the Business Continuity Exercise template cover?
It provides a 60-minute agenda, a fictional service-disruption scenario, prompts for setting scope, and a worked example that separates essential activities from the preferred tools used to perform them. It guides participants through role decisions and handoffs, then captures observations, proposed actions, responsible roles, dependencies, and follow-up points. The example is for discussion, not a tested continuity plan.
Who should facilitate the exercise, and which roles should attend?
A facilitator should read the scenario, manage the timeboxes, keep discussion within scope, and record learning actions. Invite the service owner and people who perform or depend on the service; the example names a request coordinator and customer-team liaison alongside the owner. Add roles from affected teams, such as dispatch or billing, where they are genuine dependencies.
How often should a service owner run this exercise?
The page does not prescribe a recurring cadence. A service owner can schedule it when a service, dependency, or continuity assumption changes, or use a regular service review to check learning actions and decide whether another exercise is needed. Set the cadence locally and record the follow-up point for each action.
Is this exercise a regulatory compliance test or a live incident procedure?
No. It is a discussion exercise and does not establish compliance with any law or standard, test safety-critical procedures, change systems, or contact customers. If an incident is under way, follow the organization's active incident communication route. Have the appropriate continuity, risk, or compliance owner determine which requirements apply to the service.
What is the most common mistake when using the scenario?
A common pitfall is treating the unavailable shared workspace as if it were the service itself. The exercise distinguishes the essential activities—receiving urgent requests and assigning each an owner—from the team's preferred tool. Keep proposed fallback arrangements as learning actions unless they have been approved and documented through the organization's normal process.
How should we customize the fictional Northwind Provisions example?
Replace the scenario details with a disruption relevant to your service, and identify the affected teams, service priorities, and exercise boundaries before the session. Use role names rather than employee names so the notes remain useful when staff change. Keep the sample clearly separate from approved procedures, and do not present an unconfirmed fallback channel as an established option.
Does the template connect to calendars, action trackers, or incident systems?
The supplied page is authored content: its agenda is an example table, and its learning-action prompts do not submit or assign work automatically. No live calendar, incident system, or action-tracking integration is specified. If you need tracked actions, transfer approved follow-ups into your organization's designated system using its existing process.
How do we turn exercise notes into useful follow-up?
Write observations as things participants saw or could verify, then describe one concrete action, a responsible role, any decision or dependency needed, and a follow-up point. The worked example proposes assessing a fallback record; it does not claim that such a record exists or is approved. Review actions at the agreed service review and escalate unresolved decisions through the service's established ownership route.
How does this differ from an ad-hoc continuity discussion?
The template gives the group a fixed timebox, a shared scenario, explicit in-scope and out-of-scope boundaries, and a sequence for exploring activities, roles, and handoffs. It also makes the output more actionable by asking for an observation, proposed action, responsible role, dependency, and follow-up point. It supports structured discussion but does not replace a continuity plan or a formally designed test.
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Rolled out to every employee at AutoZone (125,000), PetSmart (50,000+), A.S. Watson and Raley's (20,000) — and at larger retailers we are not permitted to name.
