{"id":8211,"date":"2015-09-29T10:37:58","date_gmt":"2015-09-29T10:37:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tsisupport.com\/?p=554"},"modified":"2015-09-29T10:37:58","modified_gmt":"2015-09-29T10:37:58","slug":"get-your-it-hurricane-season-ready","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tsisupport.com\/tsistaging\/?p=8211","title":{"rendered":"Get Your IT Hurricane Season Ready!"},"content":{"rendered":"

We\u2019re right in the midst of hurricane season here in New England, and while the last couple of years have been relatively quiet in this region, Hurricane Sandy hit the area on October 29, 2012 causing billions of dollars\u2019 worth of damage in the tri-state area, and closing businesses for days in the Northeast. In light of the reminder of just how powerful a storm can be, and the fact that it\u2019s Emergency Preparedness Month in the state of Massachusetts, now is a great time to review the steps your company should be taking to protect your employees, your data, and your infrastructure.<\/p>\n

Luckily, hurricanes aren\u2019t the type of storm that will pop up out of nowhere. In fact, in these days of advanced meteorological tracking, there aren\u2019t many types of storms that take people by surprise. Unfortunately, however, weeks\u2019 worth of warnings can\u2019t necessarily protect a building from damage \u2013 and a business from suffering losses.<\/p>\n

One of the ways that a company can mitigate their losses is to have a solid Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity plan in place. We all hope we\u2019ll never have to board up windows before a large storm hits, or try to recover equipment from a flooded facility, but it\u2019s always better to be safe (and prepared) than sorry.<\/p>\n

With that, here are some things to consider as your company evaluates your Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity plans during hurricane season:<\/p>\n

Emergency Preparedness<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

In the event of a large storm or other natural disaster, it\u2019s important to keep in mind basic safety measures. <\/em><\/p>\n

– If possible you may want to ask employees to avoid coming into the office so that they don\u2019t put themselves in danger by commuting to or from the office (even if everything seems fine at your place of business, roads could be unsafe or inaccessible along the route your employees will take)
\n– Keep a First Aid kit and fire extinguisher in a readily available and easily accessible location
\n– In the event of flooding, turn off all electricity and gas at the source, if it\u2019s possible to do so safely
\n– If a storm with high winds are expected, board up the windows and door of your business
\n– Pull together an Emergency Kit<\/a> in case your employees do accidentally end up unable to leave the office<\/p>\n

Disaster Recovery<\/strong><\/p>\n

Read our post on The Five Critical Parts to Any Disaster Recovery Plan here.<\/a><\/p>\n

– Ensure that your company is completing routine backups so that all data and information is up-to-date \u2013 there\u2019s no point in being able to access data if it\u2019s a year old!
\n– Speaking of backups, they should be replicated and stored off-site (this is where Cloud Computing is a huge bonus) \u2013 there\u2019s no point in doing backups if the hardware they\u2019re stored on gets damaged<\/p>\n

Mitigate the potential for disaster as much as possible by:<\/p>\n

– Ensuring that your hardware is housed in a technology-friendly environment (a cool, dry place, essentially),
\n– Unplugging anything that may be vulnerable to an electrical surge due to lightning strikes or damaged transformers<\/p>\n

Business Continuity<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

If your employees are being asked to work remotely during a storm, or if access to the main office location is limited or unavailable in the aftermath, it\u2019s important to have a strong Business Continuity plan in place. These plans will allow your business to continue operations remotely, without any major impacts on productivity. <\/em>Check out our post on Getting Back to Work with a Business Continuity Plan <\/em>here.<\/a><\/p>\n

– If your employees will be using their personal computers to complete company work, ensure that your company\u2019s Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) policy is up to date and that all of their equipment meets the necessary security guidelines
\n– Utilize cloud storage solutions so that data and software can be quickly and easily accessed and used via the cloud \u2013 if your hardware in the office is inaccessible or damaged, all of your data will be as well
\n– You may want to consider where your employees will work should the office be temporarily or permanently shut down \u2013 look into local office sharing spaces, or long\/short-term leasing facilities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We\u2019re right in the midst of hurricane season here in New England, and while the last couple of years have been relatively quiet in this region, Hurricane Sandy hit the area on October 29, 2012 causing billions of dollars\u2019 worth of damage in the tri-state area, and closing businesses for days in the Northeast. In…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[14,15,124,125],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nGet Your IT Hurricane Season Ready! - TSI Support<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"TSI experts talk about how having a solid Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity Plan in place will help your business sail through the hurricane season.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Get Your IT Hurricane Season Ready! - TSI Support\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"TSI experts talk about how having a solid Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity Plan in place will help your business sail through the hurricane season.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/tsisupport.com\/tsistaging\/?p=8211\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"TSI Support\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-09-29T10:37:58+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Brian Downey\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Brian Downey\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/tsisupport.com\/tsistaging\/?p=8211\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/tsisupport.com\/tsistaging\/?p=8211\",\"name\":\"Get Your IT Hurricane Season Ready! 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