With Hurricane Sandy aka Frankenstorm touching down on the East Coast, it brings up a good question about how best to communicate with employees and customers about your business response to emergencies and inclimate weather. Be prepared by following these guidelines and resources. If you need help drafting a policy, contact us today.
Prior to the emergency:
- Have Senior Management establish a standardize policy regarding business operations during emergency situations and inclimate weather situations.
- Place the policy inside your employee handbook and staff intranet – places where employees can go first before coming to an HR representative with questions.
- Email or otherwise communicate with staff members that your team is aware of the coming situation (if advance notice is possible) and guide employees to the source of where the information will be released.
- Work with IT to put the official office closure announcements on your website and to send email to individuals on your newsletter or listserv database.
If you need help drafting a policy, contact us today.
Jumpstart:HR suggests:
- Consider all of the important factors regarding the nature of your business and the safety of your clients and employees before establishing a policy.
- If your company has multiple locations, staff members and clients will need to know updates regarding their specific location.
- Set your emergency policy to reflect local government leave requirements to take the burden of decision making out of your hand and ensure that staff members can get a firm answer from local news or community members.
- Save your policy on your staff intranet and employee handbook.
- Communicate using the following: staff email, corporate voicemail greeting, notice on website and text messaging campaign.
- Social media and text message campaigns can be used to share information about how an emergency will impact your business as well.
If you need help drafting a policy, contact us today.
General Preparedness Information – From SBA.Gov
- Create a preparedness program for your business
- Identify critical business systems [PDF]
- Create an emergency communications plan [PDF]
- Test your business systems
- Enroll in the Red Cross Ready Rating Program
- Build a disaster preparedness kit
- Learn about SBA’s Disaster Assistance programs (online course)
If you need help drafting a policy, contact us today.