Testing & Exercising Facilitation

Overview

Testing and Exercising are essential parts of building robust plans that give organisations confidence that their emergency, business continuity and operational plans will work in practice.

This service therefore provides a structured, supportive way to test plans and decision-making in realistic scenarios, helping organisations identify strengths, explore challenges and improve readiness in advance of live incidents. The emphasis is on learning, assurance and confidence, not performance or fault-finding.

Testing and Exercising Facilitation can sit as a standalone service or as part of a wider programme of services, such as Emergency Preparedness, Resilience & Response Support, Business Continuity Support, or a Business Continuity Audit.

When This is Useful

This service is particularly helpful where an organisation:

• Has emergency, business continuity or operational plans that have not been tested

• Wants confidence that plans would function during real disruption, incidents or emergencies

• Needs to evidence testing or validation to regulatory, commissioning or governing bodies

• Has recently developed, updated or significantly changed plans

• Is seeking to strengthen leadership confidence and decision-making under pressure

• Is preparing for inspection, audit or external scrutiny

It is especially valuable for organisations that want to move beyond theoretical readiness and understand how plans, roles and decision-making processes function when tested against realistic scenarios.

What’s Involved

Support is tailored to your organisation and proportionate to your plans, risks and operational context. The scope and depth of work are agreed in advance and may include:

• Design of proportionate, scenario-based exercises
  Developing realistic scenarios aligned to your emergency, business continuity or operational plans, focusing on credible risks rather than extreme or unrealistic events.

• Facilitation of table-top or discussion-based exercises
  Providing calm, structured facilitation that encourages participation, shared understanding and constructive challenge in a supportive environment.

• Testing of plans, escalation and response arrangements
  Exploring how emergency, business continuity and escalation arrangements function in practice, including interfaces between teams and decision-makers.

• Exploration of roles, responsibilities and decision-making
  Testing roles and functions within plans, not specific individuals, to ensure responsibilities, authority and escalation routes are clear and practical.

• Identification of strengths, gaps and learning points
  Helping organisations understand what works well, where arrangements could be strengthened, and what actions would meaningfully improve readiness.

• Structured debriefs and facilitated reflection
  Supporting open discussion and learning, with outcomes clearly captured to inform improvement and assurance.

You can expect a facilitated exercise with clear objectives agreed in advance, constructive discussion and shared learning, and increased confidence in plans and decision-making. Following the exercise, a summary of learning and action points will be provided to support further strengthening of plans, as well as assurance, governance and audit requirements.