How To Prepare Your Business for a Fire

7/9/2020 (Permalink)

Create a contingency plan for your business

How To Prepare Your Business for a Fire

As a business owner, there are many things you can do to prepare your building and employees for emergencies. Your efforts toward creating and maintaining a safe workplace should include writing a contingency plan. There are five steps, outlined by the Department of Homeland Security, that are involved in putting together a plan of action:

• Program management
  
• Planning
  
• Implementation
  
• Testing and exercises
  
• Program improvement
  
  

Take a look at how preparing your business for a fire-related emergency might look.

Program Management
The success of your preparedness plan depends on the commitment of management. This means you need to commit to spending time and some money on creating the plan and providing appropriate resources. This step also involves researching regulations in your area that outline the minimum requirements for workplace fire safety.

Planning
At this stage of creating your fire contingency plan, you should gather as much information about fire hazards and risks as you can. Your insurance provider may be an excellent resource. You could also reach out to fire damage cleanup and restoration professionals for another perspective. Complete a business impact analysis and look at methods of reducing fire hazards.

Implementation
At this point in putting together your preparedness plan, you should have written explanations for resource management, emergency response actions, emergency communication protocols, employee responsibilities, incident management steps, and scheduled trainings.

Testing and Exercises
Train your employees in the steps of your plan. Clarify the roles and responsibilities of individuals and run drills to support employees' abilities to follow your evacuation plan. During this step, watch out for any weaknesses in your plan and reach out to the Mount Vernon, GA, fire department for advice about making improvements.

Program Improvement
During this final step, schedule reviews of the plan to keep it up to date, look for ways to evaluate the effectiveness of the plan, and use your reviews and information from tests and exercises to improve the plan.
Putting together a contingency plan for the hazards your business may face should focus on keeping your employees and your physical properties safe. Start today and reach out to available resources in Mount Vernon, GA.