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Minutes Matter

Disaster - Can it Happen to You?

What if this were your home or business? Do you have a disaster recovery plan in place?

This 5,000 sq. ft. brick home was totally devastated. An F3 tornado hit the Nashville area two weeks ago. The tornado was traveling at 60 miles an hour. In literally in 20 seconds the tornado wreaked havoc on hundreds of homes and businesses. Many lost their lives. Three clients lost their homes and many more had severe storm damage. I have always felt uneasy about tornado warnings; now I, along with all of Nashville, will take them more seriously. They come so fast, that if you are not listening to the radio you barely have enough time to take cover.

After the storm was over and people began to emerge, the devastation was so surreal. I could hardly sleep for several nights thinking about the storm victims. I also started thinking about my disaster plan or the lack of one. Of course, we create backups, but they are all onsite. We all know you should store a backup data file off site, well I did that once! I guess that backup would not be much help since it was about four years ago and I don't even know where it is. It just seemed like too much trouble and I thought a disaster like this would probably never happen to me. Now, I am feeling a little differently about a disaster plan. Disaster can come in the form of fire, water, wind, or earthquake (didn't want you leave out you guys in California). Any of these are can be just as devastating, and if you own a business your problems are compounded. I looked into creating an online backup but this method can be quite costly when you have a large amount of data.

Here is our disaster recovery plan that we are in the process of implementing:

Purchase a small safe and bolt it to a closet floor.
Make three backup copies of our software programs; one for the office, one for second office and one for safe.
Make copies of product keys for software programs to be included with CD.
Purchase a tape drive backup; rotate tapes in safe.
Rotate backup tapes monthly to second office in Alabama.
Place business insurance papers in safe.
Take photographs or make a video of all my business possessions and place in safe.
Confirm that the dollar amount my business insurance would cover lost business revenue and discuss situations that are excluded.

Implementing a plan like this will require some thought and effort. Remember these two mottos; "If you don't make time there will never be time", and "Plan your work and work your plan" - Brian Tracy.

Here are some tips to help you start implementing and accomplishing your disaster recovery plan:

If you have employees, delegate some of the tasks to them, i.e. taking photographs or burning CDs.
Burn program disks at night while you are watching TV.
Back-up data to DVDs and place in a safe.
Set up an appointment with your insurance agent to discuss your disaster recovery plan.
Do research on the internet to identify appropriate backup systems, safes etc.
Break your disaster recovery plan down into smaller attainable tasks.
Schedule tasks one by one on your calendar on a reasonable time line such as one task per week or one per moth.

1.800.343.0616