Wikipedia defines a natural disaster as “the effect of a natural hazard (e.g., flood, tornado, hurricane, volcanic eruption, earthquake, or landslide).” Natural disasters are different from natural hazards. A natural hazard turns into a disaster generally when humans are affected by the hazard and are vulnerable to it. For a business organization, this has 2 implications:
- Human involvement: When a natural hazard event occurs at a site where your employees work, it can lead to potential loss of life, injury, interruption in business processes etc. If your organization is not equipped to combat such events, it could result in huge losses, not only financial, but also in terms of other resources.
- Non-human involvement: You may have stored your business documents at an offsite location. Now if a natural hazard event occurs, your business data can be in danger, if you have not taken backups electronically – whether online or offline.
At the time of writing this post, the hurricane season has already begun in certain areas like the Caribbean. In fact, at many times of the year, usually some part of the world is in danger of experiencing a natural hazard. While federal (national), state and local governments can fulfill their obligations towards citizens by deploying suitable help channels, the business community for its part needs to ensure that disaster prevention and business continuity are given special importance. The right time to prepare is before disaster strikes.
From the perspective of managing the organization’s information, the wisest decision you could take is of converting your paper archives to electronic form. Not only this, but you should also take online backups as a precautionary measure and let your paper-based documents only be your secondary form of backing up your documents. Sohodox small business document management software is your ideal choice as it not only helps you scan your paper documents, it also lets you create, store and work with your electronic documents in a variety of ways. Its Backup and Restore Utility helps you back up your database locally. You can also back up your documents online using an online backup service.