Blog with Rob: What’s your emergency plan for the next big storm?

There’s a new reality for snow weary NYers: more extreme weather. As proven by the past two years, if you don’t have a plan in place for extreme weather days, your business will suffer. So, what’s your plan?

Internally at Advantage, we have a text chain alerting staff members by 7:30am what the plan is to give people enough time to get ready to come in to work. In fact, at the end of this winter we decided to implement a standard, across-the-board late opening procedure for anything over a certain amount of snow so people aren’t rushing in to work.

Other companies have rolled out plans for employees to work from home, such as Communications Media in NYC. When the company is closed, employees can log right into their workstations, and make sure the day is productive no matter where their staff is.

Other sound preparatory steps include testing out your staff text chain, and coming up with a plan to alert clients, vendors, etc. Nominate a staff member to update the company greeting, another to update the website and a third person to send an email blast to alert everyone necessary that the office is closed for the day.

Last, check your businesses’ insurance policy. There are always going to be days your company remains open but the weather turns out to be worse than anticipated so make sure that your policy covers any accidents on company property caused by inclement weather conditions.