Do you have the power to survive?
With Load Shedding disrupting our business operations again, we need to ensure that we are equipped to cope with it now and in the long term.
Being unprepared could mean huge losses, which perhaps you have already experienced. One month of Stage 1 load shedding will lead to 20 – 40 hours of potential lost productivity. Further to this, some computers and internet equipment malfunction after a load shedding event as they were not designed to handle abrupt loss of power, which can also lead to data corruption.
It doesn’t have to be all doom and gloom though. If anything, us SMMEs are resilient and we will make a plan no matter what. And any investments that you put in place for load shedding will likely benefit you in the long run.
These are our top tips for coping with load shedding and making survival thereof part of your long term business strategy:
1. Check and Maintain Your UPS’s
Ask your IT or UPS experts for suggestions on how often they should be checked and serviced.
2. Connect Your Equipment
Ensure that internet equipment such as your router, switches and firewalls are all connected to your UPS.
3. Work from Laptops:
Laptops keep everyone productive during load shedding. Consider adding a solid state drive (SSD) to extend battery life.
4. Invest in a Generator:
Although expensive, it can power a large number of devices and may reduce the number of UPS’s that you require.
5. Move Your Business to the Cloud:
Remove your dependence on on-site servers and run them in an always-on datacentre. This enables productivity from anywhere and on any device.
