Business continuity management (BCM) is a means to implement business continuity planning (BCP). BCM consists of preparedness measures conducted as BCP promotion activities and post-disaster measures conducted to bolster the disaster-response functions of taskforces. Preparedness measures are risk management efforts that protect businesses against potential disasters. Post-disaster measures are crisis management efforts that minimize business disruptions when disasters strike.

The TOPPAN Group has developed a BCP promotion framework for routine disaster preparedness and a disaster response regime for coordinating recovery efforts during a disaster. BCM activities are especially effective in enhancing employee readiness and securing greater customer confidence. Business continuity management is an array of defensive measures that allow a business to minimize human suffering, secondary disasters, and business interruptions when a disaster strikes.

We are convinced that the BCP activities under our BCM initiatives foster a corporate culture that robustly responds to disasters and strengthens management foundations.

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Business continuity planning (BCP) clarifies a set of policy, framework, and procedures necessary to prevent any interruption of key business operations in the event of a sudden crisis such as a natural disaster or accident. The BCP initiative also aims to restore normal business operations in the shortest possible time when business interruptions cannot be prevented. Business continuity management (BCM), meanwhile, refers to various management activities undertaken at normal times to secure business continuity, such as BCP activities.

TOPPAN’s disaster preparedness focuses on BCP updates and taskforce-function upgrades. We renovate BCP initiatives by reassessing risks and reviewing key businesses and target-recovery times, and improve taskforce functions by organizing training and drills for taskforce personnel. Administration offices set up at the head offices, business divisions, and operational sites of operating companies implement business continuity management (BCM) activities across the departments under their jurisdiction. When an administration office lacks the know-how to organize training and drills, the BCP promotion team at TOPPAN Holdings Inc. assists with the planning and operation of its training programs. The safety of taskforce members is essential to the functioning of BCP measures under disaster conditions. Hence, disaster prevention and mitigation initiatives underpin the BCM regime at the TOPPAN Group.

Our training is designed to address issues facing individual business divisions and operational sites. Dedicated drills have been arranged for the divisions and associated production sites both collaboratively and individually. For operational sites that bear a higher flood risk, we have been conducting onsite surveys of the affected areas, proposing anti-flood measures, and providing guidance on action timelines, since 2023. Instructors from related companies specializing in facility management train Group personnel in building assessment through lectures and practice sessions across Japan. Participants learn how to inspect the appearance and internal structure of a building.

The BCP promotion team spearheads efforts at TOPPAN Holdings to reinforce the functions of the Groupwide taskforce, the highest organization in our disaster response regime. The core measures for functional reinforcement include information-gathering drills simulating damage at multiple sites, revision of the disaster response procedures specified in the Basic Plan for Countermeasures against Disasters, and preparation of sites for taskforce command centers. The Production Division also holds BCP workshops for suppliers (now online) to enhance business continuity capabilities throughput the supply chain. Division members describe the importance of BCP initiatives and the points to consider in BCP for participating companies. We measure how fully the workshop improves the participants’ understanding by asking them to complete post-workshop questionnaires.

When a disaster strikes and the criteria to start taskforce-personnel actions are satisfied, local taskforces in the affected region will set up in parallel with taskforces at the responsible Group companies (head offices) and business divisions across Japan. As the taskforces launch into action, initial response units in the Groupwide taskforce will commence their operations at TOPPAN Holdings Inc. A Groupwide taskforce will be activated whenever the damage meets the criteria for taskforce activation, or when the assistant to the taskforce head otherwise deems it necessary. The Groupwide taskforce will consist of officers in charge of participating head office divisions and 11 response units led by taskforce managers, all working under the taskforce head, deputy, and assistant to the head (see the regime on "TOPPAN Group's Disaster Response Regime" above). We have already prepared an alternate framework in the Kansai region for forming a substitute taskforce, as a contingency for a disaster affecting the Koishikawa Site, the command center for the Groupwide taskforce in Tokyo.

The Groupwide taskforce will consolidate information on damage coming from the taskforces at the Group company head offices. The response units in the Groupwide taskforce will use the information to initiate their actions according to the roles assigned. Once the extent of damage is confirmed, the Groupwide taskforce will develop a recovery policy and master plan, coordinate its recovery efforts with the pertinent companies within the Group, and consider how to allot resources to individual recovery projects. Next, the respective companies will prioritize the restoration of key businesses (commercial products) specified in their business continuity plans. The Groupwide taskforce will remain operational until the operations are fully recovered in all of the Group sites. An emergency power supply is installed in the Groupwide taskforce’s command center as a contingency against power outages.