In Depth

Disaster Drill: Practice Makes Perfect

As one of the nations largest insurance companies, USAA is in the business of managing risk. So it makes sense that the company uses exercises, simulations and drills to learn how to respond in the event of a disaster.

By Stacy Collett

Obviously, continuity plans cannot exist only on paper. Regularly putting them into practice lets the company see how it would function in a real situation. USAA plans to continue running full-scale exercises at least once a year, with smaller exercises every few months. "There are so many interdependencies today. It's not just a physical security issue, it's not just a technology issue, it's not just a line of business issue, and it's not just a corporate issue," says Peacock. "They're all going on at the same time. On paper, you can guess at how they fit together and how they interrelate, but until you've actually gone through the exercise, you don't see how it might unfold. The more times you do it, the better prepared you'll be."

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