What a disaster!

menetworkjadaltd

Free Member
Dec 14, 2011
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I have seen a few posts on here that say that there should have been plans in place within their business for a pandemic, and of course there wasnt.

What other disasters do you think each of our [own] businesses should preplan for?

Have you got measurements in place which you'd like to share with the forum?
 
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I haven't seen any post specifically about pandemics, but I've always factored in a period of no business income, whether that is a pandemic, illness, laziness, recession, a new family member, poor accounting, an asteroid, an alien invasion, I decide to go sailing instead of work and so on.

It's quite simple really. Keep costs to a minimum and save as much as possible in the event of an unknown, er, event.
 
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Recession.
Flood.
Fire.
Death.
Injury.
Snow (as in unable to drive / unable to access storage unit / mail not being collected)
 
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"What other disasters do you think each of our [own] businesses should preplan for?"

Strength
Weaknesses
Opportunities
Threats

Get multiple streams of income from various sources just several hundred pound per month will do in case there is a disaster/pandemic etc.

Cut costs move in with daughter, son, father, mother, move to cheap country Spain...

Next pandemic from chickens or pigs? https://nutritionfacts.org/how-to-survive-a-pandemic/
 
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Planning for the wife working from home again. It’s been a complete disaster, I’ve actually had to get up and get dressed each day.
 
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Planning for the wife working from home again. It’s been a complete disaster, I’ve actually had to get up and get dressed each day.
I built myself an office in the garden years ago, and there has always been a fairly strict 'no girls' policy, right up until this bloody lock down. Now she's in there on a Monday, Tuesday and Thursday working. Luckily, she knows not to touch my stuff.
 
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We do keep separate. But she has these annoying zoom conference things and I keep having to turn the music down, supply coffee, answer questions and not potter about in my dressing gown.
 
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First of all, this is a really hard time for business and learned that we have to think about our business, how we can secure it and fight in the disaster. It can be of any kind like death, illness, the business losses, so we have to make plans, how we can reach on top.

There is a lot of posts available, but this is the time to follow them to secure our business.
 
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We do keep separate. But she has these annoying zoom conference things and I keep having to turn the music down, supply coffee, answer questions and not potter about in my dressing gown.
You do realise you are basically now her unpaid secretary. :D

At least you can both work. We have a 2 year old and a 3 year old, and our usual child care arrangements (my parents) are isolating, so we can only ever have one of us working at any time.
 
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Should defining disasters as internal, local, regional, national and global be necessary, or is it a case of thinking a disaster is a disaster no matter the size?
 
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Should defining disasters as internal, local, regional, national and global be necessary, or is it a case of thinking a disaster is a disaster no matter the size?

You can experience a disaster at any time regardless of what's happening elsewhere. Always a good idea to have some cash reserves to hand rather than a fancy car on the driveway.
 
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I wrote post about this on my (personal non-commercial) blog: https://pietersz.co.uk/2020/04/never-ready-for-crisis

We will never really plan for what actually happens. A few scenarios, some of which a lot of businesses cannot prepare for:

1. Space weather. Could you cope with electricity and telecoms being down for days/weeks? It nearly happened in 2012.
2. War. Middle East, India vs Pakistan of China (all have nukes), China vs US (even just a cold war would be highly disruptive to trade), lots of other possibilities.
3. Large scale internet disruptions caused by "cyberwar" or sabotage of telecoms (e.g. snipping a few undersea cables). In both cases it can be tricky to be sure who did it.
4. A vital supplier or customer of your business going under.
5. Local disruptions to transport, telecoms, etc.
6 Right now recession is to be expected, not just a possibility.

Of those, I can do something about 5 or 6. I can diversity exposure to limit the damage of 4. I can do very little about the other 3.

Lots of possibilities. Often the worst things are black swans (by definition, something no one really expected).

But she has these annoying zoom conference things and I keep having to turn the music down, supply coffee, answer questions and not potter about in my dressing gown.

A friend of mine "pottered around" naked through the background of his wife's work zoom call (on his way to the shower).
 
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