The title is one of my favorite sayings from my late grandmother.  These days, locals are saying, “Lord willing and I-526 westbound is open.”  Charleston sure was thrown a monkey wrench with the closing of westbound I-526!  Mount Pleasant was a parking lot for hours of the day while people tried to get to work and school…what a mess.  This got me thinking about businesses and how easily we can have a wrench thrown in our operations.  It’s worth the time to think about what could make your business get off track and ways to mitigate the potential downtime from it.

One potential disruption of work is relying too heavily on a few key employees.  Employees get ill or decide to move, so having more than one trained person is smart.  Think about the people you rely on everyday- what if a family situation required them to move- what would you do?  Do you have other staff members who are trained and reliable that could easily step up?  Or would you have to change your schedule to do their job as well?

Another area we place quite a bit of reliance on is software and IT!  While this can’t be totally mitigated, preparation for inevitable software failures is a wise use of time.  I know many business keep their records through some type of software but if the internet goes down it’s a time saver to already have paper documents readily available to document business transactions so you don’t lose any!

Here in the lowcountry we have lots of experience with Mother Nature and what she can throw our way!  Having documents and files saved in the cloud or on external drives is a great way to save yourself some stress when the weatherman starts his warning.

What else can throw your business off course?  I urge you to take a few minutes and think about the people/software/equipment/transportation you rely on everyday and think what would happen if it wasn’t available.  Get creative and think of ways to make your life easier in the event something goes off track.

Let’s hope they get I-526 up and running soon so our city can get back to it’s bustling self.

Sincerely,

Jordan Ilderton, CPA