Civil Unrest and Employees: When Community Concerns Become
Workplace Challenges
Easy access to the web and its multiple social platforms gives anyone a megaphone to publicly voice their opinions on social issues. Likes, shares and retweets quickly turn single statements into viral posts, offering the opportunity to easily organize protests or large gatherings in response to the topic de jour.
When mass acts such as demonstrations, riots, or strikes occur and participants become hostile towards authorities, it is known as civil disorder or civil unrest. Hostility from crowds makes it difficult for authorities to maintain public safety, causing the chaos to overflow into the streets and nearby businesses. Business continuity professionals know how to handle crises in the workplace, but crises outside the workplace can be harder to control while having an equally dramatic effect on employees.