National Preparedness Month

Improve Your Resiliency Following a Disaster

Sometimes things go terribly wrong—natural disasters, cyber attacks, disease, and human error. All can have a devastating impact on your business. Being able to respond effectively involves planning and accurately assessing risks. 

While many of these events can't be predicted or prevented, you can improve your resiliency by taking action ahead of time to protect people and property and to resume business operations as quickly as possible. The key is to have a business continuity plan—your map for survival and recovery. 

First, think about what might threaten your business, whether a natural disaster or a man-made event, and what the consequences might be. Then, think about what you must do to ensure your business' survival and ongoing viability. Here are some questions to consider:

• What are your most critical and time-sensitive business functions?
• How much downtime can you tolerate?
• Which functions are necessary to fulfill your legal, regulatory, financial, and contractual obligations?
• What must you do to maintain your market share and reputation?
   

Once you have identified and prioritized your critical business functions, identify the resources that you will need. Here are some tips:

• Maintain and frequently update contact information for your employees, including multiple ways to reach them and emergency contacts. Keep the list in more than one place.
• Verify that critical suppliers of services and materials will be available when you need them. Consider having alternate suppliers in place if your primary suppliers are unable to deliver.
• Be sure that you can communicate with key business partners, service providers, and customers or clients to facilitate timely restoration of your business.
• Regularly back up critical information and data. Store it off-site or online. 
• Plan for an alternate location in case your business is inaccessible or uninhabitable. Consider a mutual aid agreement with a similar business. Be sure that the location is or can be furnished with supplies or equipment needed to continue business operations.
• Have a crisis communications plan in order to convey information to employees, suppliers, key customers, and the media. Be sure to identify one spokesperson to ensure consistent messaging.
   

Download the Open for Business® Basic tool kit to create a business continuity plan. For more resources, go to www.disastersafety.org/.

This article was provided by the Institute for Business & Home Safety.

H1N1 Flu—Managing Absenteeism Is Key

Health experts worry that the H1N1 pandemic flu that dominated headlines in the spring, but which had a relatively modest impact, could mutate and return this fall or winter in a more deadly form. Businesses should adopt practices that encourage sick employees to stay home, and they should make plans to function with a significant portion of their workforce absent due to illness or to care for family members. In the workplace, businesses should encourage healthy habits, including frequent hand washing and covering coughs and sneezes.

RESOURCES

• Obtain pandemic planning resources from the Chamber, including a new guide containing essential action steps for preparing for H1N1.
• www.flu.gov/ Receive communications from the federal government about H1N1 and seasonal flu, access workplace resources, such as planning check lists, and receive an online H1N1 Flu Resource Kit.
• www.cdc.gov/h1n1flu Get information from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
• www.who.int/csr/disease/swineflu/en Learn about H1N1 from the World Health Organization.
• www.ready.gov/business Obtain planning resources and join FEMA's Ready Business site.