SOCIAL 

RESPONSIBILITY OR LEGAL RESPONSABILITY

After reading and find out some of the recent disasters and major emergencies on our planet I

find a common determinator in the decision tree when confronting an incident like this, especially in
large and medium enterprises, the principle of saving lives above the property is the largest and
most common objectives in the business decisions of large multinational
companies with large numbers in their bank accounts, this is something to admire, but
this decision does not come alone, this decision is part of a well developed management plan of
emergencies, which takes different steps both in the prevention as in the response and rehabilitation
that allows in theory an effective and efficient response compared to the occurrence of
the adverse event

Business emergency plans must carryout specific objectives such as: to save the lives of

employees and visitors or those who are on the floor at the time of emergency, but also aims
at the protection of property and the nature of company or factory, as this principle is
the social responsibility of the continuity of its work and start as soon as possible of its production,
and so the affected worker can earn by working daily sustenance to continue with the recovery and
rehabilitation of their homes and their lives to normal.

Oh In many cases the losses in a company in a production plant will be irrecoverable or

catastrophic, collapsed buildings, collapsed structures, machinery damaged
,faulty systems in order some of these were not predictable, at other times
these could be assessed and minimized the  impacts of an adverse event, this strongly influences the
employer's decision to back to work an the time or the raising of new factories or plants, and here
appears the liability where the employer meets those standards and laws on prevention and
emergency care including the construction of the plant, warning and alert systems, mutual aid
plans and especially the against all risk insurance.

insurance against all risks, the magic wand of entrepreneur who knows that whatever happens he

recovers part or a large percentage of their losses both physical damage and production, but it was
if my case like insurance company, I would begin to look closely my formulas on rating
risk, for years some insurance companies look at their mathematical rules about probability of
occurrence of adverse events in their customers, look at their  historical about
accident and emergencies, some of then request emergency plans that suppose its insured people
must fulfill but in the ideal it is not enough

In some countries building construction standards are extremely stringent and complete in terms of
strength, materials and construction procedures, in addition they practice control over fulfillment of
these rules, usually they’re countries whose culture and work ethic during the centuries has
made that each employee feel proud of what we he does and what ever he does excellent, they are
many other countries where it is not possible to enforce the rules, there is no way to conduct
preliminary studies of soils, materials or processes, where besides the culture is not as successful
and competitive, is rather ¨ If you can, do what you have to do, that if without effort, always taking
advantage, then appear poorly performed work, corruption of the processes, materials decisions
based on money and not in quality, poor and bad construction practices, poor mixes to save material
or lower quality raw materials with little or no control of the authorities on compliance of standards ,
thus leaving in many cases by an individual on the decisions and quality control to what he it does,
who will say, I build a wall so wrong? Or that the use the mixture was lowered? but they know in
many corporate cultures that it does not matter if something happens, if the building falls down or
whatever the great god of legal liability is present with the phrase: relax the insurance pays.

As also are warning systems or fire systems, or any other mean that it the responsibility of

the employer and no one other than him monitor or control, then its better to have equipment for the
protection and safety that the employer should buy of his profits and perhaps seldom or never be
used and that generally means large investments? Or pay a small amount of money to the insurance
company which responds when something fails on my investment money? This
is where the culture of each country and ultimately every individual plays an important role in
his decisions, there are those who invest the money necessary for the prevention and emergency
management in their company, leaving the subject of money they will receive from the insurance
only as an extreme help when they have tried everything to protect their business, but many people
simply do not invest enough neither in equipment, training or staffing for emergencies only meet the
minimum and seeking to reduce investment costs in these elements, because according to their
culture for this they pay for good insurance Again: Relax  the insurance pays

Does having insurance is a legal responsibility to relieve me of social responsibility? Whenever a

major disaster occurs everyone turns to look at their insurance, to find the small print on
the scope and the amount insured, but minor incidents happen every day,
burning plants, warehouses, walls falling in areas under construction, flood Winter, non-catastrophic
earthquakes and day to day insurance companies pay millions of dollars to their customers
as part of those legal commitments, but the employer get money, the insurance company says its
image as a responsible company, but many workers are unemployed, Many factories do
not return to work, some simply close declaring major force, causing a second
disaster in every family that stops to receive a salary for
the work with which they move the economy from supermarkets or stores, which allows that
the daily economy continue the process to run its second disaster this is really predictable.

If this is predictable if beyond I just care of my legal responsibility to pay in case of damage, if it
took some of those millions of dollars that insurance companies use in the investigation after the
emergency or disaster, if it took only a few thousand to review and advise the emergency plans, if
you take some of those thousands to advise and oversee the construction of plants and buildings, if
you used some of those thousands to oversee and monitor the fire protection systems, if you use
some of those thousands to audit , monitor, or simply advise my client to do what you he does well
done, surely he’d reduce the payment of millions of dollars in foreseeable fire damage, it would
save millions by not paying for death and disability in workplace accidents that could be controlled
or decrease the payment of millions of preventable deaths for structural damage that should never
have happened, but the best of this social responsibility would allow millions of employees whose
companies holding hands of the insurances companies reached a fastest restart of operations thanks
they get to a plant and strong buildings, effective contingency plans and procedures that manage to
reduce the impact of the company in an emergency return to their jobs to gain the necessary work to
rebuild their houses, improve their incomes, to continue the chain of the economy, paying in stores,
shopping in supermarkets and who knows if it allows him to buy insurance for his home

Taph DAVID E. SOLANO

Docente
Administracion de Desastres
Universidad Santiago de Cali.