We help organizations develop plans, procedures, and coordination strategies that support both day-to-day operations and emergency response. Our approach emphasizes stakeholder engagement, operational usability, and practical implementation to ensure planning efforts translate into meaningful action.

We design and facilitate exercises that help organizations validate plans, strengthen coordination, and build confidence in their ability to respond during emergencies. We also help capture lessons learned, identify opportunities, and develop realistic pathways from observation to action.

We help organizations review programs, processes, and operations to better understand what is working, where challenges exist, and how services can be delivered more effectively. Through assessment, facilitation, and stakeholder engagement, we help clients streamline workflows, strengthen coordination, and implement practical solutions.

Reunification and Recovery
Assistance Center
Plan Development and Operational
Alignment Project

Bottom Line Up Front

Emergency plans need to be designed around how work actually happens and how support is delivered under pressure—not just how organizations are structured—so teams can act quickly and with clarity when it matters most.

Key Takeaways

1. Design the process first; roles and ownership should follow2. Plan for real conditions, not ideal scenarios3. Make actions clear, simple, and usable under pressure

Rethinking Where Planning Starts

Emergency planning often begins with roles and responsibilities—who does what, which department leads, and how functions are assigned.That approach works on paper. But in practice, especially during a fast moving incident, it often breaks down.In those moments, people aren’t thinking in terms of departments. They’re trying to figure out:
• Where do I go to get help?
• Who is responsible?
• What happens next?And staff are doing the same—stepping into roles that aren’t part of their day to day work, making decisions under pressure, and trying to coordinate across teams in real time.That gap between structure and reality is something I’ve been thinking more about, especially in how to bring process mapping and user-centered design into emergency planning. Recently, I had the opportunity to apply this approach in a university planning effort focused on reunification and immediate recovery operations, and it reinforced a few key ideas.

Start With the Process, Not the Org Chart

This approach starts with something deceptively simple: mapping the process. Not how departments are organized. Not who “owns” what.But what actually happens—step by step—when someone needs help.What happens first? What happens next? Who is involved at each step?Walking through that sequence creates a shared understanding of how work actually flows across functions.It also shifts the conversation from “this is what my department does” to “this is what needs to be done.”This is a very subtle shift, but the change allows the process to be designed first, with roles and ownership following.In my experience, this is not how most emergency planning discussions are structured, but it creates a much clearer and more coordinated foundation for how work actually gets done.

What Process Mapping Reveals

When you map the process (literally on a whiteboard) and walk through it under realistic conditions, issues start to emerge. The planning team can visualize (again, literally, with colored sticky notes):
• Where steps become harder to maintain as volume increases
• Where coordination depends on a few key individuals
• Where lag time makes it harder to get operations up and running quickly
• Where tools could reduce real time decision makingThese are the kinds of challenges that don’t always show up in planning documents, but they surface quickly when you focus on how work actually unfolds.

Designing for Real Conditions

Another shift that happens through this approach is recognizing the difference between ideal plans and real conditions.Most plans are written assuming:
• Full staffing
• Clear information
• Readily available resources
• Stable operationsReal incidents rarely provide these ideal conditions. Planning needs to account for competing priorities, limited staff, after hours operations, incomplete or conflicting information, and unpredictable demand.

From Process to Action

Mapping the process is only the first step. The next is ensuring it is usable.One of the most practical ways to do that is by translating the process into clear, actionable checklists that teams can follow during an incident.Instead of long narrative plans, the focus becomes checklists of critical considerations, such as:
• What needs to happen immediately, what starts in the first hour, what must continue through the first 24 hours, etc.
• How and where the work gets done
• Critical considerations and remindersThis isn’t about adding more detail. It’s about making the work clearer.
Because in a real incident, staff need simple, practical guidance to step into unfamiliar roles and carry out critical tasks without hesitation.

The Next Step: Designing for the Experience

If process mapping helps define how work gets done, the next phase is testing how that process is experienced.The critical next step is walking the process from the perspective of people seeking help in the immediate aftermath of a crisis—many of whom may not yet know what they need or how to ask for it.This is where user-centered design comes in.This raises questions like:
• Would someone know where to go first?
• Would they know what to ask?
• Would they get information?
• Would they feel like someone is responsible for helping them?
• Where might they get stuck, redirected, or overlooked?
• And (most importantly) how many times are they telling their story at each redirection?I’ve found real value in bringing these principles into emergency planning—not as a separate layer, but as a natural extension of process design.Because even a well coordinated process can fall apart if it doesn’t make sense to the people navigating it.

Why This Work Matters

Incidents are fast-moving, high-stress, and unpredictable. But that unpredictability doesn’t have to result in unclear roles, disjointed actions, or inconsistent support.Starting the process by understanding how work actually happens, designing for real conditions, and translating that into clear action creates a stronger, more coordinated response.It also highlights an important gap in many planning efforts: the need to think beyond immediate response and intentional threat neutralization, and to be equally deliberate about how people are supported in the hours and days that follow.If you’re working through similar challenges or thinking about how to strengthen coordination during recovery, I’d welcome the opportunity to connect and learn how you and others are approaching this work.

Bottom Line Up Front

Too often, organizations move from observation to action item without spending enough time understanding the problem they are trying to solve. Meaningful change requires identifying root causes, developing intentional solutions, and asking a simple but important question: How do we know whether we're getting better?

Key Takeaways

1. Observations do not always reveal the real problem2. Improvement plans should measure results, not activities3. Meaningful change requires ongoing evaluation

After an exercise or real-world incident, most organizations are surprisingly good at identifying what worked and what didn't.The hotwash is productive. Observations are documented. Stakeholders generally agree on what should change. By the time an after-action report is complete, there is often a clear understanding of the challenges that need to be addressed.Yet months later, many of the same observations remain unresolved.
In emergency management, we often think of this as an implementation problem. An issue was identified, an action item was assigned, and somehow progress stalled.I've spent a lot of time thinking about after-action reviews and performance measurement recently. At first glance, they seem like different topics. One focuses on preparedness and emergency management. The other focuses on organizational performance and improvement.The more I think about it, however, the more I believe they are trying to answer the same question:How do we know if we're getting better?After-action reports identify observations. Improvement plans assign actions. Performance measures help us understand whether those actions made a difference.All three are part of the same learning cycle.

Observations Are Not Root Causes

One pattern I have observed in after-action reviews is how quickly conversations can move from observations to recommendations.A challenge is identified. An action item is assigned. A deadline is established. Everyone agrees to move forward.In many cases, we assign people tasks before we've fully explored whether we've identified the right problem.But sometimes the most important conversation never happens:Why did this occur in the first place?An observation is often a symptom, not a root cause.For example, an exercise may reveal communication challenges between departments. The improvement plan might recommend updating a procedure, conducting additional training, or purchasing a new tool.All of those actions may be valuable. But before deciding on a solution, it is worth understanding what actually contributed to the issue.Was there a lack of training? Unclear expectations? Competing priorities? Limited staffing? A process that no longer matches how work is performed?Different root causes require different solutions.Without taking time to understand the problem, organizations run the risk of implementing actions that address symptoms while leaving the underlying issue unchanged.

Action Items Are Not Outcomes

Many improvement plans contain a familiar structure:
• Observation
• Action Item
• Responsible Party
• Due DateThose elements are important. They create direction and help organizations organize work.
However, they primarily answer one question: What are we going to do?They rarely answer another equally important question: How will we know if it worked?Completing an action item is an activity. Improvement is an outcome. The two are related, but they are not the same.Updating a procedure does not automatically improve coordination. Conducting training does not automatically improve performance. Creating a checklist does not automatically improve decision-making.The action may be completed exactly as intended and still fail to produce meaningful change.
For example, consider an improvement item that states:
Update emergency notification procedures.The task itself is straightforward.But what does success look like? Are notifications sent faster? Do more stakeholders receive the information they need? Is there greater confidence in the process? Are fewer communication issues identified during future exercises?Without defining what success looks like, it becomes difficult to determine whether the improvement effort actually improved anything.The focus shifts from outcomes to task completion.

Progress Should Be Evaluated, Not Assumed

Preparedness is notoriously difficult to measure.It is easy to count plans completed, exercises conducted, or personnel trained. It is much harder to determine whether coordination is stronger, decisions are better, or organizations are more resilient.That challenge does not mean measurement is impossible.
It means measurement should be intentional.Meaningful measures should matter to both the people carrying out the work and the people who benefit from the outcome. If an organization implements a new process, updates a procedure, or conducts additional training, there should be a shared understanding of what success looks like and how progress will be evaluated.Otherwise, task completion can easily be mistaken for improvement.Just as importantly, evaluation creates opportunities for reflection.
Did the action address the problem we identified?Did it solve the right problem?Would we make the same recommendation again today?Those questions are often more valuable than whether an action item was completed on time.

Final Thought

After-action reviews create opportunities to learn.Improvement plans create opportunities to change.The gap between the two is often where organizations struggle.Too often, we move from observation to action item without fully understanding the problem, and from action item to closure without evaluating whether the solution achieved the desired outcome.The organizations that improve over time are not necessarily the ones with the longest improvement plans. They are the ones willing to spend time understanding problems, designing thoughtful solutions, and evaluating whether those solutions are producing meaningful results.Because completing the action item is not the goal. Improvement is.

I spent years in emergency management and public sector innovation. I saw organizations struggling with capacity and competing priorities. Nightingale was created to provide the kind of flexible, practitioner-led support I often wished existed.

Leigh Middleton
Founder & Principal Consultant

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