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With the snowy period of the year occurring for approximately four months between late November and early April, it’s essential that Detroit and other Southeastern Michigan business owners properly prepare for the threat posed to their technological infrastructure by freezing temperatures and heavy snowfall. [1]
Although dozens of inches of snow do not commonly fall in Metro Detroit like Northern Michigan, the Southeastern portions of the state has still experienced its share of heavy snowstorms over the years, which is why business owners need to be proactive in avoiding downtime from snowstorm-induced power and internet outages. [2]
Keep reading for the best ways to optimize your business’s IT disaster recovery plan to withstand the next Detroit snowstorm.
Although forecasts will be made, the severity of a winter storm can fluctuate from the level that was initially predicted. That’s why one of the most important first steps in optimizing your snowstorm IT disaster recovery plan is developing an employee contact list to ensure proper communication throughout the storm.
During the warmer months, create an organized digital employee contact list with emergency contact information that’s easily accessible 24/7 from anywhere. With a highly available and up to date list, you will be able to quickly contact your entire team via email or messaging system to inform them of how workflow will pause or proceed throughout the duration of the storm.
Whether you’re enacting closures or a work from home policy, it’s essential to maintain regular communication with your team to ease their concerns and avoid confusion.
Today, the best way to maximize uptime during a disaster is by implementing or optimizing cloud solutions that allow your business to continue working from home or keep data protected during outages.
When properly set-up and managed, cloud solutions are an excellent choice for storing business data due to the flexible storage size, ease of maintenance, and accessibility from virtually anywhere. When configuring your cloud solution, you can regulate and monitor accessibility permissions in a variety of ways for each member of your team to ensure the safety of sensitive data.
In addition to being correctly configured, it’s important to continually train your employees on the utilization of the cloud solution to avoid user error that causes a data breach.
Learn more:
How to protect your business in the cloud
Although 74% of companies already utilize or plan to implement a hybrid workplace model, it’s essential that your company outlines a work from home plan if you do not already have one. [3]
A detailed work from home plan will allow your team to continue business operations in the event of a severe winter storm that prevents them from coming into the office either during the storm or afterwards due to travel disruptions.
Ensure that your IT disaster recovery plan outlines the infrastructure (like cloud solutions) that allows your employees to remotely access critical files and applications that they need to complete their job functions and collaborate with fellow team members and important customers.
Collaborative cloud-based workplace solutions like Microsoft 365 for Business are great applications to implement at your workplace to proactively ensure business continuity in the event of a snowstorm.
Within a disaster recovery plan, proper data backup and recovery solutions are some of the most vital assets.
A reliable data backup and recovery solution will ensure ease of restoration for your systems and files in the wake of an outage-inducing snowstorm. It will automatically run frequent backups and store your data off-site and/or in the cloud to ensure high availability.
Learn more:
Four reasons why data backup and recovery is essential
Ready to protect your business with the right snowstorm IT disaster recovery plan?
With an IT disaster recovery plan constructed by our team of experts at NeverBlue IT, a snowstorm or other disaster no longer has to mean disruption and downtime for your Southeastern Michigan business.
A snowstorm can cause building issues, internet outages, power outages, or phone outages which threaten your business with costly downtime. At NeverBlue IT, our disaster recovery plans can keep your business up and running no matter what the future holds. With proactive planning, tailored plans, and detailed discovery, you’ll be well-equipped to withstand the next snowstorm.
Don’t wait until the temperatures drop to protect your Detroit area business!
Contact us today to schedule your free consultation.
Sources:
1: Weather Spark | Climate and Average Weather Year Round in Detroit
2: ClickOnDetroit | Here are the heaviest snowstorms in Detroit history
3: Zippia | 30 Essential Hybrid Work Statistics [2022]: The Future of Work
