Playbooks Over Panic: Writing Your Unexpected Events Manual
Why a living document beats winging it every time
I talk a lot about preparedness. About black swan events, fragility, and the kind of resilience that keeps a business upright when the storm hits. Most of that work is mental. It’s about mindset—getting yourself and your team comfortable with uncertainty, ambiguity, and discomfort. But there’s another piece to resilience that’s just as important and far more overlooked: tactical preparation.
You can’t mentally tough your way through everything. Not when a scenario you’ve dreaded for years suddenly becomes real. No matter how much you’ve visualized it, no matter how many times you’ve warned others or sketched it out on a whiteboard, when it finally hits, you will be stunned. That’s human nature. It doesn’t make you weak. It makes you real.
There’s a split second, sometimes longer, where everything seems to freeze. You feel the hit. Your chest tightens. Your brain races ahead while dragging behind all at once. And then comes the question: “What now?”
That’s where your checklist comes in. That’s where the written playbook—something tangible, something tested, something already thought through—steps in and saves the day.
It may seem silly to some. Overkill, even. Writing down in advance what to do if a certain threat materializes? Isn’t that just more busywork? But when your head is spinning, clarity becomes everything. And a checklist—simple, specific, visible—is often the only thing that cuts through the fog.
Why Checklists Work (Even When They Shouldn’t Have To)
There’s a well-known story in the world of aviation about why Asian airlines, particularly in the 1990s and early 2000s, had higher accident rates than their Western counterparts. It wasn’t because of inferior aircraft. It wasn’t because of worse training. It was because of culture.
Specifically, the cultures in many of these countries placed such a high value on respect for authority that copilots and junior crew members were reluctant to challenge the captain, even in emergencies. There were tragic instances where a co-pilot noticed something was wrong but hesitated to speak up—or spoke up too politely—while precious seconds ticked away.
The aviation industry responded not just with more training, but with better systems. They doubled down on checklists. They made sure everyone, regardless of rank, had the same reference point in front of them during takeoff, in-flight checks, emergencies, and landing. This wasn’t about removing authority—it was about making the system stronger than any one individual’s hesitation.
Checklists do something powerful: they free people from the burden of improvisation. They remove the awkwardness of having to speak up or make a call in a moment of emotional overload. They create shared language and shared responsibility. And most importantly, they prevent smart people from making dumb mistakes in high-stress situations.
Step 1: Name the Threats Before They Name You
You can’t build a checklist if you don’t know what you’re trying to avoid. Start simple. Name the top three threats that, if they hit, would really hurt. Not every little risk. Just the heavy hitters. A few big ones that transcend industries include:
Tech Outage – What happens if your core system goes down? Who leads? Who communicates to clients? Where’s the backup data? How long can you operate without access?
Key Client Loss – What do you do if your largest client—maybe 15% to 20% of total volume—pulls out suddenly? How do you handle the revenue shock, the messaging, the morale?
PR Hit – A public mistake, an unfair headline, a social media pile-on. What gets said? Who says it? When do you engage and when do you go silent?
Each of these threats is real. Each of them carries enough weight to destabilize your business for a while. But none of them should be a surprise. You know they’re possible. The only question is whether you’ve taken the time to map your response before they knock on your door.
Step 2: Build “If This, Then That” Playbooks
Now it’s time to get specific. Think in triggers and steps.
You’re not trying to write a novel. You’re trying to write something you or your team can scan in five seconds under pressure. That means checklists. That means clarity. That means simplicity.
Here’s an example for a major client loss:
If: A top client communicates intent to exit.
Then:
Notify leadership team within 60 minutes.
Pull financial exposure report within 4 hours.
Launch retention call campaign to top 20 clients within 24 hours.
Assign two team members to source 10 new prospect meetings this week.
Draft internal communication with bullet points for staff.
Review 90-day runway and flag high-risk dependencies.
You’re not trying to make the situation painless. That’s impossible. But what you can do is make it navigable. That’s what a checklist does. It cuts the emotional weight down just enough to get people moving in the right direction.
Step 3: Prioritize the Chaos With the Eisenhower Matrix
Let’s say the worst happens—and two things go wrong at once. A PR mess starts brewing right as your payment systems go down. What’s more important? What comes first?
This is where the Eisenhower Matrix earns its keep. It’s a simple decision tool that helps you sort urgent from important—and prioritize accordingly:
In a live-fire situation, the matrix keeps your team from freezing. It turns reactive flailing into deliberate triage. You don’t have to solve everything—you just have to solve the right things first.
And yes, this means having the guts to say “not now” to something that feels important. The matrix doesn’t eliminate emotion, but it gives your emotion a structure.
Step 4: Make It a Living Document, Not a Museum Piece
A playbook that never gets opened is just theater. Real ones are messy. Scribbled on. Marked up. Revised after every close call.
After every incident—big or small—you should debrief. What worked? What broke down? What did you wish you had known or said or done sooner?
Then go back and update the checklist. Improve it. Make it clearer. Make it faster. Make it smarter. And make sure everyone knows where it lives and how to use it.
The worst time to start writing your emergency plan is during the emergency. The second-worst time is to write it and never look at it again. Good playbooks evolve.
The Real Reason This Matters
Let’s be honest: most businesses don’t fail because of a single event. They fail because of how they respond to that event.
Panic leads to confusion. Confusion leads to mistakes. Mistakes lead to overcorrections and poor communication. And before long, the initial blow has turned into a full-blown spiral.
But when you’ve got a clear plan? When your team knows the checklist? When they’ve practiced it, refined it, and know where to find it? That’s when you shift from fragile to resilient.
This isn’t about avoiding discomfort. It’s about navigating it with purpose. That’s what we try to do at B:Side. We don’t pretend we’re untouchable. We just prepare like we’re not.
And when the unexpected comes—and it always does—we don’t flinch.
We open the book. We follow the plan.
And we get to work.