Julie Bestry | | Two weeks ago, I got a call from a favorite client. "You were right!" she laughed into the phone. While that's always fun to hear, the subject could have been related to anything from organizing to whether David Tennant was just as fine a Doctor Who as Christopher Eccleston. (It's that kind of client relationship.) It turns out, her recent office renovation went on far too long, leaving all of her business files in an outdoor storage POD and her computer and cables in a tangled mess in the corner of the storeroom. "But," she declared, "I survived. I had the Business Bible you made me make!"
In most cases, we organize our offices and homes so that we can accomplish everything we need to do on a day-to-day basis. Through no fault of our own, however, the world is imperfect and catastrophes can occur, making the "everyday" a distant memory. (Consider this your friendly reminder—when's the last time you backed up all of your computer files?)
In my old life, I was a television program director. TV can be a loud, wacky, disorganized place to work, but my office was a sea of calm. Shining like a beacon on one dedicated shelf, there was the “If Julie Gets Hit By a Bus” notebook, detailing locations of vital items and procedures ranging from how to file FCC reports online to manipulating satellite schedules to negotiating around excess charges from Paramount Pictures.
Thank goodness, I never got hit by a bus. But I was once grounded on a tarmac at a large Mid-Western airport (in pre-cell phone days), which amounted to the same thing. Using the notebook, my assistant was able to switch out the week's satellite feeds, reschedule appointments, and generally, keep things moving forward.
What kinds of emergencies may face us as small business owners, professionals and solopreneurs? Office fires or floods keep us from being able to work IN the office. Forrest fires or storms keep us from getting TO the office. Computer systems crash, and burglars and cyber-thieves steal our vital assets. And as much as we hope and pray otherwise, we are not immune to illnesses and accidents ranging from the merely annoying to the life-threatening.
I'd like you to think about what information is absolutely necessary for you to keep your business afloat in the face of disaster. Consider:
CONTACT INFORMATION:
--Clients or customers
--Vendors (for any accounts payable)
--Support people (attorney, CPA, professional organizer, off-site storage contact, independent contractors, employees, etc.)
--Hot or warm prospects
FINANCIAL RECORDS:
--Bank account numbers and bank contact information
--Insurance account numbers, agent contacts and the 800-number to report claims
--Payroll records (if processed on-site)
--Past three months' balance sheets
--Current aging on accounts receivable
--Current status of accounts payable
--An inventory of all assets, including location. Include anything kept off-site, such as in storage, at a warehouse, in a safe deposit box or at the attorney's or CPA's office.
--IDs and passwords
PLANNING RECORDS
--Appointment lists or bookings
--Calendar with any MAJOR customer, financial or legal deadlines. Update this at least monthly.
--List of big upcoming projects and goals. In the aftermath of a tragedy, this will allow you to think ABOUT important issues rather than just trying to think OF them.
Finally, there are high-tech and low-tech ways to STORE this information. Lowest-tech is practically no-tech: keep printouts of essential documentation in plastic sheet protectors in a fat three-ring binder. These are essentials, so if you run a one or two-person operation, one binder should suffice. If you have a staff, encourage each employee, or at least each major player, to have his/her own.
High-tech options mean you can back up to external hard drives or flash drives stored off-site, or even internet vaults to which you can securely upload your information, downloading it at your convenience from any safe harbor. I'm a big fan of flash drives because of their portability and ease of use. Last summer, 128 MG of memory cost me $28; yesterday, I saw a 1 GB (!) flash drive for $9.99. Memory is inexpensive, so money is no excuse not to keep full backups.
For those of you interested in off-site Internet vaults, your ISPs and hosts may offer options. For example, I've recently:
-Data Deposit Box
-V Vault
-X Drive
Check out a more detailed list at OnlineOrganizing.com
or Google "online storage".
Obviously, having a Business Bible is only one step in organizing your company to protect it from disasters. To familiarize yourself with the Federal Government's advice for businesses, please check out Ready.gov.
Start building your own Business Bible, and please share your ideas with us here at The Business Consortium regarding what you consider your "desert island" business documents.
When you say "You were right!", wouldn't you like to be laughing about it?
--
Julie Bestry
Best Results Organizing
"Don't apologize. Organize!"
organize@juliebestry.com
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