There is no set time for a disaster to strike a business. Businesses can get seriously affected by all types of natural calamities and a human can do nothing about it. Fires and explosions have the power to fully devastate buildings in spite of their location. Your business office building may very well be the target of attack by anti-social elements which can never be predicted by anyone.
Evaluate and analyze
After such a disastrous event, evaluating and properly analyzing all the damage done to your business facility quickly and accurately is a must. This is required for the insurance recovery functions to help you get back to your business operations in no time.
Therefore you must do the bulk of the important stuff before any kind of disaster happens. You should start with identifying the things that needs the most protection. This is easier for small business while it gets a little complicated with bigger business with operations in many countries. Your business facility may be in an earthquake-prone area or even a hurricane-prone area. Such businesses should be prepared for any situation, should the bad time strike.
Better be prepared than be left sorry
Once something happens, you will have no time to discuss and allot roles so this should be covered in your pre-disaster preparations to succeed. You must have a list with names ready to fill every role. You should even have a written communication set up for reaching those members with different roles with all of their phone numbers (both land lines and cellular), emergency contact information as well as their e-mail addresses.
You must have all the important documents that are related with your business ready at hand. The business needs to store its documents in many locations and media with necessary backups. Each and every aspect of the business needs to be properly analyzed with all its strengths and vulnerabilities.
The next step
After a disaster happens, you have to take steps to contact every member of the group and organize for coping with the disaster as soon as possible. You may not be ready to enter the building due to safety concerns. But you can assess the extent of the damage done, determine the unsafe areas, and have an approx idea of the level of damage done what your insurance coverage can take care of. This is where your pre-planning will come in handy.
Then comes, the stage where you have to prepare a report where your damage is assessed which will be very helpful for the insurance company and the government authorities. Planning well ahead before the disaster strikes is the only way out. Lack of planning will only make things worse and result in more loss than profit.
The final word
Business owners need resources to assist with disaster preparation and this is where the insurance coverage comes in the picture. Insurance corporations have loss management departments that provide valuable help. A business owner has the sole power to survive a disaster. With some careful planning and evaluation, your business can survive any worst-case scenario.