Business Resilience & Continuity
Have you thought about resilience and continuity planning for your business?
Unplanned incidents and emergencies can happen at any time. Even rising costs can be a real challenge. By identifying where your vulnerabilities are and understanding how to respond, you will be better placed to navigate challenges, and to quickly return to normal operations with minimal impact if an incident does happen. To support you with this, we have gathered below resources to help you find the information that you need.
Did you know?
20% of businesses will suffer a fire, flood, power failures, terrorism, hardware or software disaster, and of those without a business continuity plan:
%
will fail in just over a year
%
will not even reopen
%
that experience a significant data loss are out of business within five years
%
of businesses that suffer total loss of a mission critical facility and do not have business continuity plans go out of business within 2 years
Help to prepare your business continuity plan
Flooding
The Environment Agency provides information relating to flood risks and flood alerts and a flood forecast for the next 5 days. You can sign up to free flood warnings from the Environment Agency to be alerted when your home or business is at risk, by email, phone or text. Alternatively, you can call Floodline on 0345 988 1188 to register. If your business has more than one premises, you can get flood warnings for multiple sites by registering with the Targeted Flood Warning Service. You can also monitor here the levels of the county’s rivers and streams and find rainfall statistics. The Met Office issues weather warnings when severe weather is expected. You can sign up for Met Office weather alerts here.
Oxfordshire County Council has produced the Oxfordshire Flood Toolkit to support businesses and residents with understanding their flood risk, how to be prepared, the different types of flooding, and what to do if a flood happens. The National Flood Forum also has lots of useful resources and advice. Check your risk: see if your community is at risk from different types of flooding.
Your business in hot weather
The Met Office predicts that heatwaves are now 30 times more likely to occur than before the industrial revolution – and are projected to become increasingly frequent and intense with the changing climate. How can you keep your office cool, and what other factors might you need to consider, so that you can keep your business running, as well as for your comfort and wellbeing, and to protect your staff.
The Health & Safety Executive (HSE) has good advice on managing workplace temperatures. The Low Carbon Hub has some useful leaflets with practical tips on keeping your office cool sustainably and also on how to keep cool at home. Staying well-informed about weather forecasts with the Met Office will help enable you to take timely actions to protect your business. Sign up to UK Health Security Agency (HSA) Heat Health Alerts to keep informed about hot weather which may be a risk to health. Keeping cool, whether in the office or at home, will also help prevent servers and any electrical equipment from overheating and breaking. Check your postcode to see if your area is vulnerable to extreme heat.
In extreme heat, power outages can be more frequent. You can be protect your business from the impact of cuts by having a backup plan in place, such as a backup generator, battery-powered equipment, keeping power packs fully charged, or knowing where you or employees could relocate to temporarily if required. Does your business have a cloud-based finance system if you do need to work elsewhere? Back up regularly electronic files on an external hard drive or cloud-based system and make hard copies of key documents. Know who to call in a power cut (call 105). Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN) ‘Powertrack’ lists any current power outages in the SSEN area.
Check your insurance – ensure your business insurance covers any risks of the summer season and consider incorporating a business interruption policy in case your business has to close. If travelling, consider if travel is essential, and if travelling by road, check your coolant levels, and always carry water. National Highways has some useful hot weather tips.
Get your business ready for winter
Preparing for winter can mean more than being ready for floods, particularly with the increased frequency and severity of extreme weather events. The Met Office issues weather warnings when cold weather is expected and you can sign up to UKHSA Cold Weather Health Alerts for information and advice to help you to prepare. Thames Water has lots of tips to help you Get Your Business Ready for Winter and to avoid burst pipes and water leaks. If you or staff are on the road, the Met Office has these simple steps to check your vehicles are winter ready. If you are working at home, the Low Carbon Hub has a Warmer Winter Checklist with tips on managing fuel bills and keeping warm, and advice on who to contact if you or employees need support. Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN) ‘Powertrack’ lists any current power outages in the SSEN area – where you can also report a power cut – and you can download and register on the Powertrack app to receive automatic updates to your phone.
Cyber Crime
32% of all UK businesses reported a cyber-attack in the past 12 months. There are simple steps that you can take to help keep your business safe online. Here are some resources that can help:
Small Business Guide: Cyber Security
Free Small Business Cyber Action Plan
Small Business Guide: Response & Recovery
Check your existing cyber security
Report a cyber incident
24/7 live cyber reporting for businesses.
Free online training for SMEs
Get confident with what cyber security means for you and learn some actionable steps you can take to stay safe online.
South-East Cyber Resilience Centre (SERC)
Helping organisations avoid Fraud and Cyber Crime with cyber security guidance and resources.
Fire safety
Starting October 10th 2024, Oxfordshire Fire and Rescue Service will only respond to automatic fire alarm activations where a building is deemed to be a high-risk building, or where a fire has been confirmed or there are signs of fire. If your building is not considered to be high risk, such as an office, shop, or warehouse, you may need to update your fire risk assessment and improve your safety measures. Learn more about this policy change, your responsibilities regarding fire safety, and fire safety generally.
Terrorism & Martyn’s Law
The Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Act 2025 or ‘Martyn’s Law’ aims to ensure stronger protection for the public by requiring certain public premises and events across the UK to take steps to protect the public from harm. The Act received Royal Assent on 3rd April 2025. The Government intends to allow an implementation period of at least 24 months before the Act comes into force to allow sufficient time for set-up by the regulator and those responsible for premises and events to understand their new obligations and to plan and prepare accordingly. The Home Office will publish statutory guidance during this 24 month period. Businesses are encouraged to check whether they fall within the scope of the Act and to consider the requirements, though do not need to begin complying with these until the Act come into force. Find out more about Martyn’s Law and how this might affect your business at ProtectUK and at the Home Office.
Would you like to hear more about these topics?
You can stay informed by signing up below to receive occasional text messages with information and advice, keeping an eye on this webpage and if you use LinkedIn, by following Enterprise Oxfordshire.
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If you would like to sign up for this service to receive text messages with information and advice for your business, please click below to fill in the simple sign-up form.
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If you have suggestions for what information you would find it useful to hear about, do please let us know: [email protected]
If you have stories of how your business has shown resilience or used continuity planning that you would be happy for us to share, please do also get in touch, we would love to hear.
Find out more
This short two-minute video from the Business Continuity Institute (BCI) explains what business continuity means and why it is important.
Useful links:
Oxfordshire County Council Resilience Page
Advice on how to individuals, communities and business prepare for emergencies.
Thames Valley Resilience Forum
The Thames Valley Local Resilience Forum supports partner agencies to prepare, respond to and recover from emergencies.
Q&A
I am new to business resilience and continuity, what do they mean?
The Business Continuity Institute define continuity as “having a plan to deal with difficult situations, so your organisation can continue to function with as little disruption as possible”. Resilience is defined by the International Standards Organisation as “the ability to absorb and adapt in a changing environment”.
What is a business continuity plan?
A document that sets out step-by-step what actions should be taken before events to prevent risks to your business, and also during and after events, so that you can continue to operate and recover with minimum disruption.
Is Business Resilience the same as Climate Change Adaptation?
The climate is changing, and could mean physical risks for your business, as well as for your business processes, and the health and wellbeing of your employees. Being ready means understanding the vulnerabilities so that you can reduce any risks and your business can continue to operate and grow.
Apart from SMS messages, what support is available to help me in my business?
The Business Continuity Institute has a wealth of resources online, some available free by registering for a web account. See also the links to resources above. If you would like more information, to talk with an advisor or support with drafting a plan for your business, please email [email protected].
What was the Code Red pilot?
The CODE RED – Oxfordshire Business Resilience Scheme was a pilot service project delivered by Enterprise Oxfordshire in partnership with the Berkshire Growth Hub, Buckinghamshire Business First, the Thames Valley Local Resilience Forum and local resilience teams. The pilot ran between May 2024 and April 2025 and was funded by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) Innovation Fund 2023/2024. Following the pilot, Enterprise Oxfordshire continues to provide support to businesses with resilience and continuity planning as part of it’s business support offer. If you have any questions or are looking for support for your business, please contact us.
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