Aurora Safety
Aurora, Illinois
630-907-2020, www.aurorasafety.com
Aurora Safety develops evacuation and emergency-preparedness plans to ensure that a company can continue to operate in the event of a natural or man-made disaster by establishing auxiliary, easily accessible business headquarters in advance. Owner Mike Fagel’s goal is to get executives to sites away from the chaos, in much the same way that New York companies did on September 11, when they sent employees to locations in Queens and Westchester County. Aurora Safety works with various corporate clients in the manufacturing, health-care, and financial industries, as well as federal, state, and local governmental agencies.

Disaster by Design
Stratford, Connecticut
203-673-4847, www.jurispro.com/JonathanBest
President Jonathan Best, whose experience in the security business dates back to 1980, says his goal is to give executives a realistic sense of their vulnerability to crises. Best helps develop evacuation plans, working with hospitals and corporate clients (in industries he declines to specify), on emergency-planning techniques. Best specializes in large-scene operations—like the evacuation of a major hospital—and disaster management. A key piece of advice for his executive clients? Think beforehand about what you would take with you if you had to leave your office in less than 10 minutes. Passport, credit cards, identification, and cash are the essentials, Best advises, especially since electronic money transfers might be unavailable in the event of an emergency.

911 Consulting
Wilton, Connecticut
203-563-9999, www.911consulting.net
C.E.O. Bo Mitchell says most of corporate America hasn’t adequately planned to handle an evacuation. To fix that, 911 Consulting focuses on readying large companies, schools, and hospitals for emergencies. Mitchell promotes what he calls “emergency operations centers,’’ places where executives can retreat under duress, instead of focusing on bunkers. An emergency operations center can be another room in the same building, it can be on the street, or it can be off-site, and it can exist in various forms, whether “hot” (computers and communications equipment are set up and ready to be used at the alternate location), “warm” (equipment exists in storage but must be set up at the new location), “cold” (equipment must be ordered or brought into the backup location), or “virtual” (a laptop can be set up to work wirelessly anywhere). Mitchell’s clients include Cablevision, Exxon Mobil, and tea company Tetley USA.

Giuliani Partners
New York
212-931-7300, www.giulianipartners.com
This firm, started by former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani in 2002, provides advice on emergency and evacuation planning and security matters to large companies such as Shell Oil and Entergy Nuclear Northeast (owner of the Indian Point nuclear power plant). Giuliani Partners’ motto? Relentless preparation develops a culture of responsibility and awareness. In one technique, Giuliani Partners trains clients’ employees to act like first responders by effecting quick evacuations to get out of harm’s way. Giuliani Partners also helps clients establish backup command centers and create internal security procedures.

Expert Security Consulting
Norton, Massachusetts
508-454-4494, www.expertsecurity.com
For 15 years, founder Howard Levinson has been working with corporate clients of various sizes who seek to enhance and improve their security programs and assess and strengthen their evacuation plans. He also prepares nearby command centers so that clients can easily make the transition to doing business at a secondary location.

Threat Analysis Group
Houston
281-494-1515, www.threatanalysis.com
Threat Analysis Group works with oil and rigging businesses, health-care companies, banks and insurance firms, and universities on threat and vulnerability assessments, risk management, and security-force protection. Thanks to Threat Analysis Group’s Gulf Coast location, the firm also assists oil and gas companies in preparing for hurricane-related emergencies. One client, an oil company, makes it a priority to track every single employee in real time during storm evacuations using a remotely operated surveillance system.