The Crisis Simulator is a fantastic tool for testing and training crisis response strategies. With over 75 scenarios to choose from, you can select one from our catalog or customize your own to fit your organization’s unique needs. With the ability to change almost anything, many customers use Crisis Sims for bespoke tabletop exercises containing specific methodologies, Incident Response plans, and industry-specific threats. Is this something you’ve been considering, but don’t know where to start?
Drawing on three years of Crisis Sim experience, I’ve identified five essential elements that consistently lead to successful custom simulations.
1. Have a good plan
Having a plan is vital to dealing with a crisis, and the same thing goes for creating a Crisis Sim. When planning a crisis scenario, it can be extremely helpful to have a general outline of the storyline, different branches, and specific IR goals to hit before creation begins. This can be done in many different ways, depending on your preference. A whiteboard session, document outline, Figma, or even pen and paper can help outline different injects, attack vectors, and responses.
2. Use naming conventions to keep things organized
When creating a multi-branch exercise, injects can often be reused or slightly modified to engage users and reflect the impact of their previous choices. However, with multiple copies of injects, it can be difficult to track which inject links to which option or how it flows into other branches.
Organizations have found that using simple naming conventions greatly reduces confusion. For example, including the inject number and different branches ([Inject], [Branch]) provides a clear visual and numerical reference. This approach is especially helpful when managing copied injects with identical titles.
3. Create useful attachments
Crisis Sims and tabletops are all about engaging the audience and immersing them in the scenario. Adding useful attachments can significantly enhance realism with minimal effort. Attachments in injects provide context, information, or illustrate the effects of previous decisions. Organizations often use sanitized SOC screenshots, short videos featuring leaders, or their IR playbook to drive engagement. With support for various file types, these additions make scenarios more interactive and realistic.
4. Flexible interludes
Interludes are a new type of inject in Crisis Sim that don’t require action or voting from participants, offering versatile use cases. Interludes can be used to bring the audience back to the main branch if they begin to choose options that aren’t in line with playbooks, framing it as a decision made by a manager or leader. Interludes can also be used as a conversation starter rather than relying on voting, as conversation is key during crisis exercises. Instead of listing a few options, interludes can allow for open-ended questions, which lead to discussions on the best next steps or things to consider as the scenario progresses. Interludes can also introduce new issues and provide more context.
5. ‘Create with AI’ to get started
‘Create with AI’ is a new feature in Crisis Sim that allows organizations to create customized scenarios with artificial intelligence. This feature is great at getting a highly customized scenario started, all within a few minutes. When using ‘Create with AI’, it’s vital to provide as much information within the title as you can. Giving more information within the prompt will lead to a better scenario. Additionally, AI is still growing and improving, so take a deep look at the scenario after creation and make alterations where needed.
Share your thoughts
Have you got any top tips for customizing Crisis Sims? Comment below and share them with The Human Connection Community!
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