Emergency Management Planning: Not If, When
Part I: Why You Need a Plan
— By Julia Rose

• Most businesses do not have an emergency or recovery
  plan even though they know it is important.
• 47% of businesses that experience a fire or a major theft
  go out of business within 2 years.
• 44% of businesses that lose records in a disaster never resume business.
• 93% of companies that experience a significant data loss are out of business within 5 years.
• The majority of businesses spend less than 3% of their total budget on business recovery planning.
  Source: Michigan State University

It's a Friday evening, business as usual. You're a small operator, just recently moved from your home to an office after hiring two additional office staff. Three of your four cars are booked, and everything is running smoothly. Your evening dispatcher ran a little late, but your day dispatcher filled in for the extra 10 minutes. Then the lights go out, and your business screeches to a halt. All your computer screens are black, and your dispatcher is panicking. A car hit a pole about a mile from your business, which knocked out the power to your grid, and, because your phones are cordless and rely on electricity, it eliminated your communications too. One of your customers — a new, out-of-town client — can't locate her chauffeur and is now calling your office only to get an endless ring. Call forwarding through the phone company was on your to-do list, but you were busy setting up the new dispatch software on your new computers to get around to it. It didn't seem important until this moment.

With luck, the power outage will last only a few minutes and you'll be back to business. What happens in those minutes, however, is critical. If your business fits the statistics, you don't have a plan in place in case this "emergency" lasts longer than a few minutes. Perhaps you did think about writing a plan but thought it would be too time-consuming or expensive to implement. Who has the time? Consider the alternative — being unprepared can damage your business permanently.

What is an Emergency?
An emergency is anything that interrupts the flow of business as usual. The limousine industry, for most, is a 24/7 business, and, while it's not pleasant to think about, emergencies will happen. Florida operators know all too well how crippling the weather can be after a brutal hurricane season. Would you know what to do if your business experienced a fire or a flood? Do you have a plan in place if your business is the victim of robbery or vandalism? Who would take care of your business if you got sick or had a family emergency? If your business went up in flames overnight, how would you notify your customers or keep your cars running if the information is stored only on the now-incinerated computers? The emergency, however, could be smaller. Consider how debilitating a dead cell-phone battery or a computer crash could be, especially if those are your primary business tools. For some small operators, it could paralyze business until the problem is resolved.

Assess Your Risks
According to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), preparing a plan should be part of every business, large and especially small. However, before you write a plan, you need to determine what your risks are. Most small-scale risks such as theft, fire, floods, power outage, traffic accidents, etc. are central to every business and should be planned for accordingly. Natural disasters like tornados, severe winter weather, and earthquakes are often regional and need to be addressed in the emergency plan. These natural disasters can often be planned for before the disaster occurs. For example, if you know you are in an earthquake risk zone, taking simple steps like anchoring bookcases or applying window safety film could prevent a large-scale disaster. Assessing your risk can save unnecessary planning time if the threat is unlikely to happen in your area.

Community Resources
FEMA recommends meeting with local area businesses and emergency response agencies such as the fire department or police to coordinate your plan. Save yourself some time by meeting with neighboring businesses to discuss what plans they have written. Then go to those who know emergencies best — emergency agencies will have plenty of information to compile a plan and may even provide additional advice that you didn't think about, including how to prevent disaster from occurring. They are also very helpful in your business's risk assessment. For example, have you considered the dam 50 miles from your office a threat to your business? Emergency agencies may, and you should know how to deal with it if it does become an issue. Knowing what to plan for is half of the battle.

Implementing the Plan
Planning, though critical, is not the only component of emergency management. In the opening scenario, you, the owner, were present to handle the emergency. The scenario would be very different had you not been there and your employees had to think quickly to contain the problem without your immediate assistance. How can you ensure that your employees would do what you want them to do? Is there a point person on site at all times? Does your staff know how to reach you after hours? Once the plan is written, simply handing the manual to your staff is not enough. Rehearsing your plan with your employees and empowering them to make split-second decisions is as essential as the plan itself. This should be done on at least a bi-annual basis, and employees should be notified of updates immediately.

Accidents and emergencies will happen; they are an inevitable part of life. As a business owner, you are conscious of protecting your investment.

You probably try to buy the latest upgrades your financial situation will allow: new cars, software, hardware, telephones, communication devices, etc. You also have insurance to cover your vehicles and your building, but having an emergency management plan could be the best insurance any company can have. LD