Preparing your business

Is your business emergency ready?

It doesn’t matter how big or small your business is, emergencies can happen that can have a devastating impact on your whole operation.

Emergencies can affect every area of your business - your staff, your customers and even your supply chains. Loss of utilities and transport emergencies can stop day-to-day operations that you normally take for granted.

Disruption can come in many forms from fire to flooding, evacuations, to pandemics, storm damage to cyber attacks. Emergencies happen when you least expect them but you can plan in advance to be better prepared.

Taking time to plan for emergencies and preparing your staff and business can save you time and money if something does happen.

Having an emergency plan in place which outlines what, how, where and when actions would be taken in an emergency can take the stress out of a situation because you and your staff have a clear understanding of the role they need to play.

Business information and advice

There are some great websites out there with really good advice about what you can do to prepare your business:

The Government's Business Continuity Management Tool Kit
Peterborough City Council’s business continuity information and advice
Cambridgeshire County Council business continuity information and advice
The Business Continuity Institute
Protecting your business from terrorism advice from Cambridgeshire Police
Business fraud advice from Cambridgeshire Police

The front cover of a guide to preparing for emergencies

Preparing for Emergencies Guide

How would you cope if there was a major power outage? How could you ensure your organisation could still function? Do you have a plan in place to prepare?

What would you do if your business became the target of a cyber attack? Where would you operate from if you had to evacuate your premises because of a fire or flooding?

Major disruption can prove costly for any organisation and particularly many small or medium sized organisations who may struggle to recover from an emergency.

The Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Local Resilience Forum (CPLRF) brings together blue light emergency services, local authorities, the Environment Agency, public health organisations, military, government agencies, transport, utilities along with voluntary and faith organisations to plan, prepare for and respond to such emergencies.

Our handy guide outlines some simple steps you can take to protect your organisation or business and more widely to help your general day to day operations.

Do you have a business continuity plan?

Every company no matter how large or small should have a business continuity plan (BCP).

It is your survival guide to help your company survive and continue running after a major emergency, disruption or disaster such as a cyber attack, a fire a flood or a prolonged power outage.

The plan should be the step-by-step process of what should be done to prevent risks that can lead to your business having to close, protecting critical business functions so you can continue operating and implement a recovery strategy.

A complete plan will protect your most vital operations and provide a structured response in a crisis.

What should a Business Continuity Plan include?

It may feel like a daunting process but preparing for emergencies now can save you time, money and the impact on your business

To be effective, your plan should cover all areas of your business:

Risk Assessment: Start by identifying the threats and vulnerabilities specific to your business. Are your premises in an area prone to flooding? Are you particularly at risk of fire because of what you produce?
Recovery: Outline how you’ll respond to different types of disruption, what will you do if your IT infrastructure goes down?
Communication Plans: How will you inform staff, partners, and customers about what is happening and what it will mean for them. Make sure the right people are informed and ready to act.
Training and testing: Does everyone in your organisation know and understand their role in an emergency procedure?
Don't just send them plans and ask them to read them, provide emergency procedure training to make sure they know their role in your emergency planning and regularly test your plans to keep your team prepared.