The Safety Video You'd Never Think You'd Need

Yesterday, I was speaking with a fellow consultant who convinced me to promise him to share this safety video.

Background
This particular consultant is a programmer and project manager who was worked with tools such as COBOL and CICS for a variety of customers, including a number of large companies whose names most of us know. Recently, in his semi-retirement, he was nominated to attend the FBI's (Federal Bureau of Investigation) Citizen's Academy. It's a way for the FBI to get citizen involvement, explain what they do and how they work, and get community, political and religious leaders involved in the process.

In my case, this is a consultant I happen to know, have known for quite a long time, and have occasional chats with about a variety of consulting (and other) topics. In our latest conversation, as he told me about his most recent adventure, his foray into the Citizen's Academy, I was fascinated, as I often am with his exploits. As part of that, he insisted he saw a great YouTube video that I should share with all of you. It gives you tips on what to do if a shooter comes into your building. I initially pushed-back, insisting that it wasn't too off-topic for my blog and probably unlikely to happen.

Why I Agreed
He made the point to me that we all go through a variety of other types of safety training. It's not that we think there will necessarily be a building fire or a lab explosion, but we get safety training to avoid disasters and to know how react for things like lab explosions and fires - why not be trained for the also unlikely event of a terrorist or other shooter attack - it's not that you think it will happen, it's just another type of safety training.

In that, I understand what he's getting at - it doesn't mean we sit around worrying about it, but it pays to be prepared. Additionally, I did have a customer who had had problems with potential protesters coming into the building. They had to keep the building unmarked out of concern that protesters would break in and do damage. Depending on the type of protester, the situation could be similar to some other types of attacks.

Maybe I'm also more likely to believe that disaster can happen than the next person. As a young person growing up in Illinois, there always seemed to be an oil tank or grain elevator exploding or someone getting hit by a train due to the belief that the signal was stuck (and it wasn't). I don't necessarily believe shooters will come into the laboratory or offices but who knows. And this six-minute video is a lot shorter than most of the safety training we go through, so it's fairly painless to view.

Here It Is
RUN. HIDE. FIGHT.® Surviving an Active Shooter Event - English

Finally
I know it's been an odd week where I've posted some truly unrelated things, but plan to get back to business in my next posts.

Gloria Metrick
GeoMetrick Enterprises
http://www.GeoMetrick.com/