Build Your Preparedness Community

Create support in your preparedness community

No man, or woman, is an island. Remembering this is important when you develop an emergency preparedness plan. You surround yourself with like-minded people in nearly every aspect of your life so why do THIS in a vacuum? Think about building your preparedness community.

If done correctly, you’ll encircle yourself and your family with logistical, financial and emotional support during a crisis. Sounds simple. It’s not.

Starting Questions

Don’t put the cart before the horse. Debate these questions before you recruit every person you’ve ever known:

Is this right for you? Why?
Do you HAVE to be in charge?
Are you a good listener?
Can you manage others?
Are you prepared for fights among members? What’s the protocol to handle those situations?

Strategize

Building a preparedness community may be the toughest phase of your emergency planning; people can be challenging. It’s worth it. I swear. Just push through the doubt created by endless questions, like who are you going to trust and to what degree? How do you set boundaries? Are they applicable to everyone? Great questions with multiple answers. Keep these things in mind and you’re at least partially there:

Create a mission statement for your community. It’s important to do this step first so you have a general idea of its purpose and scope.
Decide how many members; what skills they should have and then develop membership requirements around it. Be thorough when deciding on skills, but don’t overdo it. Do you need 100 doctors? Probably not; look for people who can be cross trained and then do it.
Build your leadership team first. The foundation to any successful group is in leaders that know how to lead and when to step back, allowing others to get the job done. True leadership is about the good of the all, not ego.
Money, money, money. To ensure your preparedness community runs fairly, smoothly and efficiently, you’ll need to have a conversation about finances. It may be uncomfortable but it’s necessary for success.

What to Avoid

Indifference – Don’t be deterred by a society not fully supportive of your prepper ways. Be the change you want to see. Keep your members active with regular meetings, workshops and by listening to them.
Lethargy – This is a sure fire way to send your community to an early grave. You’ve made a commitment so stick with it. But strike a balance with other obligations for a well-rounded life.
Extremists – Don’t let your mission get pushed around by people with their own agenda. If it does happen, get out and take as many people with you as you can. Don’t waste your time and energy on bullies.

Conclusion

Approaching a prepper community with awareness – like an Operational Security Plan, which is based on a need-to-know system – can help you dodge the pitfalls that lead to collapse. If a community member doesn’t need to know a sensitive detail, don’t give it to them. This method keeps sensitive information from falling into the wrong hands and control evenly dispersed among members.

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