In the Philippines, typhoons and floods are a fact of life. Lately, we’ve been through a lot of severe weather –one of which was the recent Typhoon Odette. Despite those harsh conditions, businesses must operate normally, especially accounting service firms like our company. Rain or shine, flood or no flood, we need to service our clients because our clients’ business must go on.

We believe we’ve been quite successful navigating through natural calamities, proven by feedback from our clients and from our team.  Hence, we would like to share with you some things we’ve learned and hopefully, you can disaster-proof your business as well. Here goes:

Disaster Tip 1: Set a Business Goal and Support It

Vertaccount Co-founder, Aye Navarro, suggests that it should start from the top. The leaders must set the objective and do it proactively. In Vertaccount’s case, our goal is simple – to continue servicing our clients while not compromising the safety of our team. We’ve created a Business Continuity program where we’ve put in funds and logistical assistance necessary to reach this goal. Disasters cost money and in the Philippines, management must view it as a cost of doing business. Supporting this program likewise means setting the parameters, empowering and properly delegating the goal to the line mangers of the company for them to execute. The company is also quick to reward impressive and exceptional behavior made by the team during disasters.

“Any disastrous event can severely disrupt the operation of our company. That’s why having a business continuity program in place helps us take precautions that’ll ensure deliverability.”
– Marc Jhon Robles, Vertaccount Accounting Associate

 Disaster Tip 2: Execute that Plan and Let Qualified People Run It

Our HR Manager Jennifer Lee has been instrumental in the success of the program. Here are a few tips from her:

• Let everyone in your business know about the program – Should calamity strike, every employee should know how to respond. Those who have urgent tasks/deliverables should already have fail-safe measures so as not to compromise business continuity. Furthermore, each employee always has an extra set of clothes in the office.
• Keep communication lines open – Everyone should be reachable and have backup phones and numbers. This not only helps in coordination between colleagues. It also helps you check up on the safety of your employees and co-workers.
• Define roles and responsibilities – Each and every employee should have a designated role. For us, those who live near the office are assigned with an office key should others need to submit urgent deliverables.  Our HR department is also assigned to monitor the weather, check up on employees, and advice them on any updates. In fact, our first update always comes out no later than 5:15AM, before the first employee leaves for the office.
• Prepare a safe and comfortable shelter – This is definitely a must. Typhoons are unpredictable and that’s why we make it a point that lodging for our employees is already put into place even before a storm strikes. If one of our employees happen to be at our office and is not capable of going home, we’ve taken the liberty of providing a safe and comfortable shelter for them nearby.
• Provide assistance to those affected – Extend help to your employees’ home and families as this also fosters goodwill. This can come in the form of food and monetary aid or temporary housing assistance.

Vertaccount employees staying safe (and dry) during a recent storm back in September 2013

“The company provided us with a safe and comfortable place to stay in.  When it comes to productivity, I believe we were able to finish the assigned task within the day.”
– Roman Cruz, Vertaccount Accounting Associate

Disaster Tip 3: Be on the Cloud, Protect Critical Data and Take Advantage of Technology

Big technology is easily available even to small businesses today. There is no excuse not take advantage of the tools at your disposal.

• Be on the cloud – Put your mission critical systems on the cloud. With that, you don’t have to worry about busted hardware, qualified tech support, down Internet pipes, etc.
• Back up. Back up. Back up.  – Back up your data daily on site. Perform off site backups weekly. Adjust the frequency depending on your volume. Take advantage of real-time backups. For a few dollars a month, your data is backed up in the cloud immediately. Also, a very simple but crucial step commonly missed is restoring data regularly.  What good would it do if you can’t restore your data, right?
• Have Redundancies – Pick an office that has a power generator. Invest in second Internet pipe. The second one doesn’t have to be as fast (ergo not as expensive) as your primary pipe.
• Telecommute – During times of emergency, allow your staff to telecommute, if you aren’t already doing it. Empower them with mobility tools such as laptops and VPNs (a technology that allows them to access your office server). 

“VA really looks for a safe and comfortable place to house its people in times of emergency situations so that it can still deliver to its clients. When people feels safe despite calamities, productivity continues.”
– Jan Mapanao, Vertaccount Accounting Associate

Disaster Tip 4: Monitor Your Program if it’s Meeting Your Goal

After executing our program, we asked our clients Jaenelle Kikawa and Dante Aragon of Energy Management Consulting & Construction  if they noticed any disturbance in our services during the recent typhoons in Manila. They both answered “NO.”

That word never sounded so sweet.

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