Are your premises at risk of flooding ?

As the UK and local businesses slowly begin to recover from the significant disruptions to cashflow and programme forced by last week’s  last week’s heavy snowfalls and freezing temperatures it’s easy to forget that there are problems still to come as the snow melts and rivers test their boundaries over the coming days bringing the potential for further loss and disruption to business critical activities.

Floods happen so quickly

I vividly recall walking the Pennie Way as a schoolboy and seeing first-hand how quickly the smallest of quietly meandering moorland streams rose in seconds to become powerful raging torrents that would knock you off your feet if you didn’t have an eye upstream and weren’t agile enough to clear their path.

Can you see around corners?

What’s your equivalent process for keeping an eye upstream – how do you see around the corners.  It’s too late to crane your neck around at the corner when the situation changes that rapidly and the potential for damage and loss is so high.

The ability to forecast likely events or “horizon scan” and plan ahead lies at the heart of all business continuity success.

So what should you do to prepare for the thaw?

Please don’t rush out and buy insurance.  That won’thelp you in the immediate aftermath and we want to prevent the problem not struggle for weeks convincing loss adjusters that we really did have all of that kit when we’ve lost the up to date inventory (or never had one in the first place).

Here’s a couple of bullets to start you thinking:

• Daily monitoring of the weather up to 5 days ahead
• Registering for the Environment Agency flood alerts at your postcode
• Checking whether you business is in a flood plain
• Checking whether your business is in the deluge path of a reservoir
• Checking where the water mains are – mechanical failures are equally likely to cause a flood
• Checking where the stop cock is and that you can access and operate it
• Transferring critical papers to higher shelves (you can store separate copies elsewhere but sometimes originals are needed)
• Making plans to re-locate if all or part of your premises is denied or lost

Have you written and tested your fallback premises plans?

If you have a substantial business and need to put together fallback premises plans we can do that for you in a matter of weeks from concept to live exercise.

Imagine how good it feels to know that come hell or high water (sic) you can continue to operate seamlessly from another site within a few hours of Armageddon?  What’s that worth?

It’s got to be worth a phone call to find out more hasn’t it?

Call Us on 08456 434775 for a free consultation or e mail your questions to info@veterusconsulting.com

@Veterus

Portsmouth

11 Jan 2010

Crikey it’s cold!

Has Your neighbour got a key?

Following a last minute change of plan the other day, my wife and I both rushed out of the house to walk the children to school.

I didn’t take a house key (which I realised) so I was a little anxious about my ability to get back into the house but thought that as we had left together, we’d probably come back together.

The childrens schools as separated by about 1 minutes walk so I dropped my daughter off then returned to the other school to meet my wife (and her key) so that I could go back home to work.

I realised en-route that I had also left my mobile phone at home but was unfazed because I imagined it woud be easy to find my wife at the school.

Despite scouting the grounds and checking all of the usual places then ringing my wife I was unable to find her so I set off home alone thinking perhaps she’d be home – she wasn’t.

Fortunately, our neighbour was at home and we had provided him with a key for such eventualities so I managed to get in and get the kettle on without delay or drama.

Now you could argue that I should have taken the key and phone when I went out but you know, sometimes sh*t happens and the best laid plans of mice and men gang aft agley (sp?) as Robert Burns well knew.

My colleague threw a suprise business continuity exercise for a client a couple of weeks ago and one of the senior managers had just returned from 3 weeks leave, popped out in his shirt sleeves for a pint of milk and ended up bundled into a waiting transit van ahead of a 2 day off-site exercise.  As I said, sh*t happens.

My advice is to think through as many potential disruptions and mitigations as possible and make good plans through effective training and exercising.  If you do that, you might survive and get back on track regardless of whatever nasty suprises life throws at you.

Like the scouts – be prepared!

@Veterus

Business Continuity relies on teamwork and training

Fire is normally one of the greatest threats to any business – nowhere more so than in the Royal Navy. You can’t just shuffle out into the carpark and drive home to call the insurers when you are stuck in the middle of the southern ocean – particularly when you are under enemy attack from ships, missiles, submarines and aircraft.

All RN personel are trained fire-fighters and practice responding to fires and floods EVERY DAY to ensure they are fluent in the drills needed to effectively fight fires.

Whole-ship Emergencies

An engine room fire or helicopter crashing on deck above one of the ships magazines (the kind that holds supersonic missiles rather than glossy publications) quickly becomes a whole-ship emergency requiring several 5 man firefighting teams supported by tens of other boundary coolers, smoke containment sentries and hose handlers, breathing apparatus replenishment teams, first aiders and command and control staff.  Training is extremely realistic and always followed by a “hot debrief” (no pun intended) and a more formal written and verbal debrief to ensure that salient points are identified and lessons learned.

Total Electrical Failures

Another key drill carried out on all ships is known as a TLF which stands for “total electrical failure” whereby all electricity is instaneously lost – this isn’t simulated – they pull the metaphoric plug out!

In the midst of entering harbour or a real or simulated warfighting environment with supersonic missiles raining in, submarines lining up to torpedo you and fast jets bombing and strafing the ship you soon learn the importance of system knowledge and intuitive teamwork to activate fallback operating modes for vital systems and supplies.

How Business Continuity Consultants can help

Business continuity consultants can help you design and carry out realistic training exercises that will protect your business, your people, your capital equipment and premises in the event of fires, floods and mechanical failures.

Where can you find expert advice?

Call Veterus Consulting today on 08456 434 775 to benefit from our extensive, expert experience in planning and conducting these complex and demanding tests of teamwork and leadership.  Learn from the best.

@Veterus