Disaster Planning for Businesses
A disaster plan, also known as a business continuity plan, provides a written, executable plan to allow a business to continue at least limited operations during a natural or man-made hazard or disaster. The plan also covers information to help the business quickly recovery fully from the disaster. Both the federal government and professional business organizations provide websites with development guidance and free tools to help you develop a disaster plan for your business.
Other People Are Reading
-
Ready Business
-
The Federal Emergency Management Agency developed Ready Business as a guide to help small- and medium-sized businesses develop and implement disaster plans. You can download all FEMA publications on the topic from the site for free from ready.gov (see Resources). Ready Business includes a section of the costs of specific planning and preparation actions, including a lengthy list of free preparations a business owner can make. FEMA also provides templates for basic emergency plans.
Small Business Administration
-
According to the Institute for Business and Home Safety, about 25 percent of businesses fail to reopen after a major disaster. To help reduce this number, the U.S. Small Business Administration offers a disaster preparedness website with planning and recovery tools, including information on available disaster assistance for businesses and how to apply for it. SBA offers a free planning guide: "A Disaster Planning Guide for Small Business Owners" is downloadable (see Resources).
-
Emergency Preparedness for Business
-
The Centers for Disease Control's National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health provides free resources and guides to help businesses plan for emergencies. These include management planning guides from government and private organizations, facility protection publications and guided online tools to lead a business owner step-by-step through the development of an emergency and evacuation plan that is Occupational Health and Safety Administration compliant. The site also provides free educational materials for business owners and employees (see Resources).
Institute for Business and Home Safety
-
The Institute for Business & Home Safety provides free business continuity and hazard loss reduction tools and guides in an effort to decrease the social and economic effects of natural disasters. The institute conducts research and provides guidance and tools to help businesses improve preparation, construction and maintenance. It provides specific actions to modify your building, storage areas and procedures by hazard, i.e. earthquake or tornado, and step-by-step basic planning documents in its "Open for Business" basic workbook. After completing the worksheets, you will have a basic disaster plan (see Resources).
Basics of Building a Plan
-
If the plethora of tools and guides seem overwhelming at first, read up on the major concepts of business continuity planning for a broad view of the topic. Inc. Magazine's article "How to Build a Business Continuity Plan" addresses the concepts of risk assessment, risk reduction, redundancy and implementation in easy to understand terms, with real world examples (see Resources).
-
Resources
- Photo Credit cluster disaster concept image by .shock from Fotolia.com
