Pending Storm; Pending Doom

A quick scan of the weather headlines late on Thursday afternoon: a “Nor’easter” storm going through rapid escalation, know as “Bombogenisis”, looks ready to hit New England tomorrow with rain, snow and hurricane force wind gusts. Now it is Sunday, and many small and midsize businesses along the northeastern coast are wondering when, or if, they will be able to reopen. The impact of disasters is increasing. We can argue about climate change versus weather. We can discuss our aging infrastructure. We can debate whether to plan for disaster causes or effects. If we do not, however, make our businesses more resilient, the quantity and severity of disruptions will continue to grow.

The coming storm should not foretell coming doom.

By taking advantage of proven cloud services, most small and midsize businesses can protect themselves from disruption. Many businesses in coastal areas of New England may be without power and other utilities for 2 to 4 days. Businesses with no continuity plan are down and out. Given that about 50% of businesses shut down for a week will fail within six months, “down and out” can be fatal. If you rely on VPN or remote desktop to on-premise systems, you are still at risk — no power means no on-premise networks or servers.

Businesses with key systems in the cloud, however, can be up and running if employees have power and Internet access.

So what are your next steps?

First, measure the impact on your business of a disruption lasting one day, three days, and five days?  As you do, consider the full cost of recovery, including post-disaster productivity loss as your work to recover lost data and time while keeping things moving forward.

Second, consider the value of keeping your business running rather than having to recover and regroup. Beyond the dollars and cents, understand the value to your customers, to your reputation.

Third, contact us for a complimentary Cloud Advisor Session to discuss your cloud and continuity strategies.