Avoid Winter Weather Woes With Remote Working

It’s officially winter, at least in the Northern Hemisphere, so we can expect some bad weather, but the last couple of years have redefined the meaning of cold and icy, and it looks like this year could be even worse. The 8th of December saw winds of 165mph (264km/h) in some parts of Scotland, with England seeing less extreme, but still dangerous, winds of 90mph.

That kind of weather qualifies for the highest warning level from the Met Office, and people were advised to stay indoors until the winds passed. Schools and businesses have been forced to shut their doors.

Too Common to Ignore

Extreme weather conditions are becoming a seasonal routine for many businesses. Gone are the days when it was acceptable to say “Oh, it only gets that icy once a decade, everyone is in the same boat”. This is the third serious winter in a row, and it’s time to add bad weather to our business continuity management plans.

Remote Working Is Good for Morale

While some people might joke that extreme weather is appreciated by employees, because it means they get a day off, that’s not strictly true. Bad weather days are usually stressful affairs. If the weather is too bad to go to work, it’s too bad to go shopping, or to the gym, or anywhere else for that matter. A day in watching DVDs might be nice, but most people spend the day worrying about the mountain of work that will be waiting for them when they get back to the office.

If you haven’t already included remote working in your business continuity management plans, it’s probably the first thing you should look in to. Thanks to technologies such as email, VoIP, and VPNs, you can easily make it possible for your employees to work from anywhere in the world, without your customers having any idea that things aren’t business as usual.

Keeping Your Employees Safe

To make sure that your employees are safe and happy this winter, consider the following:

Encourage everyone who can work from home to do so during bad weather.
Keep an eye on the weather forecast while you’re at the office. Allow employees to leave early if it looks like the weather might turn bad during the working day.
Invest in high availability technologies. A large scale power-loss such as the one caused by the gales in Scotland would bring most offices to their knees, but you don’t want your network going down for easy-to-avoid reasons.
Be flexible about working hours during the winter. It’s better for people to drive slowly and be late than to crash their cars on a slippery road.
Set a good example. Put safety first, and encourage everyone else to do the same thing.

While business continuity is a popular buzzword during the winter months, a lot of the lessons learned during the winter will apply at all times throughout the year. Backups, redundant systems, and communication policies should be in the back of your mind at all times when you’re expanding your network.

This article was written by Crispin Jones on behalf of Maintel, who offer telephone systems for small businesses as well as assistance with forming business continuity plans. Crispin is currently trying to get his boss to let him work from home!

This is an original article published on SEO Desk with exclusivity.

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