What is a business?
At corporate2community we often talk about how businesses need to be resilient, prepared for disaster and ready to adapt to suddenly changing circumstances.
However, when we talk about businesses, we’re not necessarily only referring to big corporate organisations. Our broad definition of ‘business’ encompasses any organisation that employs people and offers products or services.
In our view, every type of business needs to put resilience to the forefront. Whether that’s a medium-sized business that employs 200 people, a small enterprise that employs 20 people or a micro business where the business owner works at home.
We also consider not-for-profit organisations, local councils and government departments as ‘businesses’. While their intention and purpose is not to make a profit for the benefit of the owners or shareholders, the reality is that they need to not make a loss in order to best serve their constituents.
People need a resilient federal, state and local government to develop and implement well-planned, multi-stakeholder policies that will help support them before, during and after a disaster.
People need resilient not-for-profit organisations that are able to provide on-the-ground assistance in times of need.
People need resilient commercial enterprises that can adapt and continue to safely trade to help to maintain a thriving community .
Building resilience is everyone’s business
Further, building resilience in businesses should be an essential function of every organisation.
That means everyone within a business should have a role to play in how that business builds resilience. Building resilience is not just the job of the leader, the business continuity person, or the risk manager.
For instance, if a person is employed in a financial department, then that person is responsible for maintaining the financial resilience of a business by adhering to budgets, monitoring cash flow and reporting on the business’ financial status on a regular basis. If a person is in the corporate social responsibility department, then that person is responsible for ensuring that the organisation complies with its corporate social responsibility mandates.
Does your business have the right capabilities and skills?
In this new era of more regular and frequent disasters, the question all businesses need to ask now is – do we have a plan for change, are we prepared to deal with whatever challenges we may face and do we have the capabilities and skills to build resilience?
Some ideas for starting to build resilience include through employee education and training, by creating a culture of collaboration within your business, by applying better risk management practices, improving your business’ ability to adapt to change and the effective use of project management. But above all, you can start building resilience by fostering a culture of growth and development within your business.
We do disasters differently
We know that people are the foundation of resilience. The more we build capabilities in people the more resilient our communities will become.
Our expertise means that we can help communities, businesses and governments from thinking to doing disasters differently.
To find out more about how we can help your community, contact us at [email protected].
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