A solid disaster plan can be a competitive advantage for your business.

You’ve heard the saying: “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail.” That’s especially true when it comes to business disaster preparation. If you’re just responding after a disaster, you’re too late.

Experts across the business world agree that thorough preparation well in advance of a disaster is a competitive advantage. In fact, some businesses actually grow in the aftermath of a catastrophe merely because their competitors were unprepared and couldn’t continue operations.

So, what do we mean by prepare?

Well, of course, backup power is on the list and your Cat® dealer can help you get that done. But there are other considerations. For example:

• Employee communication
• Insurance
• Alternate business locations
• Payroll policies (will you pay if people can’t work?)
• Customer retention
• Product and service delivery

That’s just to name a few. Of course, prepping isn’t an iron-clad guarantee that you’ll come out unscathed, but it sure gives you a better chance.

Two out of three small businesses don’t have a concrete prep and recovery plan. Why?

• “It won’t happen to me.” Reality check: You will be hard pressed to find many locations in North America that aren’t at risk for a disruptive event – earthquakes, tornados, hurricanes, high winds, wildfires, volcanos, ice storms, blizzards, and, of course, man-made hazards.
• “It takes time.” We get it. You’re busy, but imagine how busy you’ll be when you’ve lost your customers to your competitors because you couldn’t take care of them.
• “I don’t know what to do.” It’s true – there’s a lot to think about. It can be overwhelming. Thankfully, there’s a wealth of good advice out there, so we’ve rounded up some helpful articles from reputable sources to make it easy to get started.

Five ARTICLES TO help you get started

1. Practical Advice for A Holistic Business Disaster Prep Plan: Straightforward and logical advice that’s applicable to most business types. Read article
   
2. Leadership and People Focused Preparation: How you handle disaster can impact company culture for the better or worse. We like the people and safety focus of this article. Read article
   
3. Comprehensive Checklist for Small Business: This article gives you 21 actionable things you can do to prepare for the worst. Read article
   
4. Disaster Preparedness Advice for Facility Managers: This white paper from FEMA is a comprehensive guide that breaks down the challenging job of managing a large facility in the face of disaster. Read article
   
5. Business Insurance Claims After a Major Catastrophe: Detailed advice from Forbes on getting your ducks in a row for the tax season after disaster. Read article  

If you take the time to think about these things in advance, you’ll find that the response and recovery process is less stressful, and often less costly to your business.