Mass Notification in the 21st Century

Natural disasters are simply a part of life on earth. In the recent past all of us have become aware of major natural disasters in the form of volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes and tsunamis. Modern technology gives us significant early warning capabilities for impending natural disasters but without mass notification aimed at the affected populace, early warning systems address only part of the problem. Society no longer accepts death from natural disasters as inevitable; people expect disaster preparedness and mass notification through emergency communications from their governments as well as their employers.

Indeed, businesses have a responsibility to protect their employees from harm. Besides natural disasters, in the 21st century many people have experienced calamities that were initiated by humans, including terrorist bombings and random shootings. Here in the 21st century, mass notification is doubly important for safety. Businesses must have contingency plans for crisis management and one proven method of mass communication is through use of an ENS (Emergency Notification Service), also known as an emergency communication system. An ENS can be used by a wide variety of clients including large corporations, small to medium sized businesses, utility companies, schools, hospitals, government complexes, police and fire departments - any grouping of people who need to be informed of impending or existing safety issues.

Companies, including small to medium sized businesses, can use their ENS to go above and beyond emergency alerting and serve as an automated messaging center. With its enhanced capabilities for mass notification, the ENS can become a valuable tool for improving workplace productivity and communication. The ENS can serve as a main broadcast center for notifying all or selected groups of employees about the latest in company news, policies and procedures.

When broadcasting mass notification messages to the people and groups in the company's ENS database, the Emergency Notification Services messaging system continues to contact each person on the list until the message is delivered. The database supports multiple contact points for each person with up to four phone numbers, two e-mail addresses, a pager number plus a temporary number. The ENS system maintains a log of message delivery progress which can be reviewed in real-time to track critical message delivery. Successful and unsuccessful messaging attempts are logged in the database and all messaging data can be formed into reports as needed at any time.



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