This is but a short list of potential disasters, but more than enough to drive the point home: the likelihood of another Katrina-scale disaster, natural or otherwise, is best described as “not if, but when.”

No Line in the Sand
Emergency humanitarian aid is of such a compelling nature as to set aside considerations of who are the recipients and what are the costs. Business leaders must seek out the appropriate level of participation in the general rebuilding, while still balancing the demands of a number of stakeholders. In the wake of Katrina, the list of stakeholders has multiplied. It now includes: investors and shareholders, board members, employees, outsourced and contracted services, specialized suppliers, strategic partnerships, distributors, transportation infrastructure, brokers and intermediaries, customers, media, basic public services, community human services, regulatory bodies, public health officials, and more.

It is difficult to differentiate between corporate actions that are investing in the business’s profitability and actions that are simple generosity; the recovery of the infrastructure is essential to the profitability of every company. Looking forward, corporations must answer hard questions. Where will they draw their lines in the sand? What contribution of shareholder assets is appropriate to help with the rebuilding of a city? What level of contribution is necessary to ensure that the business can continue to function? What level of corporate generosity is appropriate?

The Shape of Things to Come
The need to look ahead is urgent. Katrina has given us a glimpse of just how poorly prepared we are.
In the face of the unknown, one powerful planning aid is Scenario Planning, a tool used by both private and public institutions to expand thinking around decisions that involve complex, future courses of action. It is particularly helpful in imagining dramatic leaps of change - potential risks or unseen opportunities that may lie outside the perspective of typical incremental planning approaches. It forces the question: "What if the world were different than the one we know today?"

We have seen the continuum of stakeholders along which corporate responsibility must be shaped. Scenario Planning offers a second continuum that runs from past to future and from reactive to proactive. It looks like this:

Reactive

• Emergency Evacuation and Assistance: after the fact
• Disaster recovery efforts (i.e., New Orlean’s infrastructure): after the fact

Reactive and Proactive mixed

• Emergency Evacuation preparedness: planning for immediate humanitarian aid when disaster strikes again
• Disaster recovery preparedness: learning how to rebuild basic infrastructures
• Longer term economic redevelopment: beyond basic infrastructure, investing in rebuilding the economy

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