Tag Archives: business disaster preparation

Weather Protection

How to Keep Your Workplace and Employees Safe During Disasters

Hurricanes. Tornadoes. Fires. Floods. All of these are disasters that can wreak serious havoc on your business, especially if you’re not prepared. Maybe you’ve never experienced a disaster firsthand. But chances are you will experience one at some point, as they occur more frequently and inflict billions of dollars of damage on businesses across the country.

Before disaster strikes, it’s important to have a plan. That might seem like an obvious statement, but the fact is that 70% of small business owners say they don’t have a written plan in place. Not having a plan can cost your business dearly.

Check out these startling facts from the Federal Emergency Management Agency:

  • 40% to 60% of small businesses don’t reopen after a disaster.
  • 90% of small businesses close within a year of a disaster if they can’t reopen within five days.

That’s why you should think through any potential risks that could face your business, determine how you would respond to them, and communicate your plan with your employees.

Before a disaster, you should verify your Google My Business listing. That’s where you can update your hours of operation and communicate with customers in the event of a disaster. You should also back up all of your documents, including your list of important contacts, install smart devices to detect weather emergencies, and connect Wifi-enabled cameras to ensure that you have a visual record of what your business looks like before and after a disaster to make the small business insurance claim process easier.

During a disaster, your number one priority is your employees’ safety. Communicate with them using group chats. Switch to a remote work setup to steer them away from dangerous conditions. You should also stay in touch with your customers by redirecting business phone calls to a line that you are monitoring and editing your hours in Google My Business.

After a disaster, if everyone is safe, you can begin to rebuild your business and give back to your community.

Check out this infographic with tips to keep your workplace safe before, during, and after a disaster.

 

 

General Safety Issues

LEVERAGING CLOUD TECHNOLOGY TO SAFEGUARD AGAINST NATURAL DISASTERS (GUEST POST)

There is a close relation between disaster preparedness and cloud technology. Many small and medium sized enterprises are adopting cloud technology with the aim of improving their preparation for disaster. This move is paying off for businesses that invest in cloud technology.

Today’s small and medium enterprises are in a unique position to adopt the cloud, which does not just provide a competitive advantage but it also improves the ability of businesses to recover from disasters while protecting company information.

Many small and medium sized businesses (SMBs) cannot afford lengthy downtimes. Such companies should have the ability to recover quickly from a disaster. Cloud technology offers sound solutions and comprehensive data security measures that enable businesses to be better prepared for disasters. The technology also enables companies to recover quickly from natural disasters such as floods and fires as well as man-made problems like theft and destruction to property.

Businesses that adopt the technology early, especially in the area of server virtualization, enjoy even greater disaster preparedness. It is very important for companies to embrace innovation so that they respond better to challenges. In order for business owners to take advantage of the opportunity to improve disaster preparedness, they should take the following actions:

Start planning now

Business owners should device a disaster preparedness plan now. The plan should have an evaluation of how strategic technology such as cloud computing can help in such efforts.

Implement strategic technologies

For better disaster preparedness, small and medium sized businesses should adopt integrated cloud backup which offers offsite storage and disaster recovery. Cloud computing also offers automated physical to virtual backup conversion which allows businesses to easily recover data from applications like accounting programs and customer relations software.

Protect company information

Business owners can exploit cloud technology’s comprehensive security and backup solutions to protect their physical and mobile systems. Many business owners opt to backup in the cloud.

Review

Conduct a quarterly review of the company’s disaster preparedness.

The cloud environment is quite stable. Clients are allowed to perform technical due diligence to estimate the level of risk in a cloud solution. When choosing a cloud service provider, find out how the cloud is structured. Many cloud service providers have their data centers in stable countries that are not prone to political instabilities or any other natural disaster such as earthquakes or volcanic activities. This minimizes data loss due to natural or artificial factors.

Many cloud service providers allow business owners to undertake site visits and audits to find out the providers’ recovery time and point and to calculate the impact on the business in case of a failure.

About the author

Zoe Maldonado is a freelance writer and blogger for TechBreach who enjoys writing about all things mobile and electronic and spending time with her very active twin boys.