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When an incident or crisis occurs, you want to have the right people available quickly. And you want to be able to deploy key personnel immediately. That’s why you set up on-call schedules for those roles. In this blog, I’ll discuss on-call schedules and what they entail.
On-call duty refers to the availability of individuals who are ready to respond immediately to incidents or crises. In crisis management, you therefore arrange on-call shifts (also known as standby shifts or on-call rotations) for the most critical crisis roles.
Scheduling on-call shifts involves creating a clear schedule in advance that specifies which individuals are on duty and when. This schedule must provide 24/7 coverage, ensuring that qualified personnel are always available to respond to emergencies. Depending on the type of role, one or more individuals may be on call simultaneously for a given role. For example, we often see two loggers on call.
Scheduling on-call shifts provides clarity and structure. Individuals know in advance when they are on duty and can prepare for their role during their shift.
On-call duty requires that on-duty personnel be reachable and available 24/7. You want to be able to contact them—for example, to call them in or consult with them—especially outside of regular business hours. You also want to be able to deploy these individuals immediately. Therefore, make clear agreements about how many minutes it should take for on-call personnel to be ready for deployment. This often means they must have access to a car to get to the location quickly and that they must remain sober during their on-call shift so they can respond appropriately and drive safely.
On-call duty (also known as flexible on-call duty) is a type of on-call duty that is not based on a predetermined schedule, but is activated on an ad hoc basis. With on-call duty, you establish a pool of suitable individuals in advance whom you can call upon. When you call on individuals, you ask about their availability, and they can indicate whether they are willing to fill the requested crisis role at that moment. Technically speaking, the person called upon can therefore also refuse the assignment. On-call duty is therefore usually not used for the most critical roles in the crisis organization.
Someone on call is not formally reachable or available, which is why they are usually not compensated for this.
Although on-call duties are important for crisis management, they also present challenges:
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