The Importance of Having a Back Up Plan For Your Business

Do you have a contingency plan for your business? If this year has taught us anything it is that this is something which every business needs to have in their arsenal. The events of 2020 has caused many businesses to shut down for good, sadly so of course. Those who have survived have been those who quickly understood the need to pivot and refocus the efforts of their business. Some of those businesses would have had a contingency plan in place from the get-go, others quickly put together a plan B with the goal of survival.

This has been the clearest example yet of why a backup plan is so critical.

Managing Potential Threats

Whilst very few could have predicted the global crisis that we have seen take hold this year, this is an example of course of the potential threats to our business. This is very much the extreme side of the spectrum but there are in fact many more risks, more probable risks in fact, which pose threats to our business. The failure of equipment, a new competitor with big investment behind them, employee walkout, fire damage, these are just some potential threats to your business, are you equipped to deal with them?

The Importance of Forward Planning

Contingency planning is a little like insurance, you may well find that you spend money and take steps to ward off any potential threat to the business and then never use it. Like insurance however, if you do not have such a plan in place and then something and does happen, you will wish that you had been more prudent in the first place. Creating backup plans like this doesn’t cost you very much time or effort and any spending on equipment or plans that will help when things go wrong, should always be seen as an investment in the preservation of your company.

What The Solution Looks Like

Of course there is no one size fits all with regards to how to secure a backup plan in the event that something goes awry, the key is to be specific. Take the time to note down all potential threats to the business, be it a minor issue which causes big waves such as no power to the business or a large scale crisis which needs quick decisions and action. Taking each threat on its own, and by probability of it taking place, simply look for solutions which will remedy each one. For example if you are looking at a power outage, the investment in a generator before this happens would be a shrewd move. Each issue has as solution and if you have it in mind now, you will be in the ideal position to deal with anything that may come your way.

Following what we have seen happen this year with the lockdown, and the way in which so many businesses have struggled, it is more apparent than ever before that all businesses in all sectors should be focused on the creation of a contingency plan.