After a disaster, you’ll probably need to get in touch with a lot of people. But you could also have a limited ability to recharge your electronic devices, including cell phones, laptops, and tablets.
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The following checklist, adapted from recommendations by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), will help ensure you have enough battery power when you really need it:
- Be prepared. Keep extra batteries on hand, and keep a car charger in your trunk. If you want to be really well prepared, purchase a solar-powered or hand-cranked battery charger. Basic models are available for less than $20.
- KISS it (keep it short and simple). If you need to use a phone, try to convey only vital information to business contacts, emergency personnel, and/or family.
- Be patient. If you can’t complete a call using your cell phone, wait 10 seconds before redialing. This can help reduce network congestion and will sap less battery power than constantly redialing.
- Dim it down. Reducing your screen brightness saves battery power.
- Pretend you’re flying. Placing your phone in airplane mode saves battery power because the phone will stop searching for a network signal. You won’t be able to call or text message while your phone is in airplane mode, but you can compose e-mails and texts, and send them all at once when you are connected.
- Don’t play around. Don’t use your device to watch streaming videos, download music or videos, or play video games, and close any apps you’re not using. Otherwise, you’ll use valuable battery life and contribute to network congestion.
It’s vital that your organization has a comprehensive emergency planning and response strategy in place at all times. BLR’s upcoming live webinar will help you develop and implement a process that will ensure that your organization is ready to manage any contingency. Click here for details.
- Avoid congestion. Voice networks quickly reach capacity under disaster conditions. Try to reserve voice communication for emergencies; for other communications, use text messaging, e-mail, or social media instead. These data-based services are less likely to experience network congestion.
- Go mobile. If you lose power, you can charge your cell phone in your car. Just be sure your car is in a well-ventilated place (remove it from the garage), and do not go to your car until any danger has passed. You can also listen to your car radio for important news alerts.
- Remember: Safety rules still apply. If you do not have a hands-free device in your car, stop driving or pull over to the side of the road before making a call. Do not text on a cell phone, talk, or “tweet” without a hands-free device while driving.
Be Prepared!
A mighty magnitude 8.2 earthquake rocked Chile recently, triggering landslides, cutting power, and generating a tsunami. Weeks later, a magnitude 5.1 earthquake shook the Los Angeles area. Also recently, devastating mudslides decimated parts of Washington, claiming at least 41 lives, and powerful thunderstorms spawning tornadoes touched down in parts of the central United States.
The key takeaway: Natural disasters and other catastrophes can strike anywhere, at any time. It’s important, therefore, that your organization has a comprehensive emergency response-planning strategy in place at all times. If you wait for an unexpected and potentially devastating situation to arise, it’s too late, because without a plan for how to respond before a disaster strikes, you risk placing your workforce further in harm’s way.
Join us on June 19 for an in-depth webinar on emergency preparedness and response strategies that will help you manage unexpected catastrophes, minimize the impact, and recover more quickly. Learn More
On June 19. BLR will conduct an in-depth, live webinar on emergency preparedness. Our speaker, a seasoned attorney who has helped many companies create, update, and improve emergency preparedness plans will lay out a process to help you develop and implement a process that will ensure that your organization is ready to manage any contingency.
You and your colleagues will learn:
- How best to perform a comprehensive assessment of potential natural risks
- Proven strategies for establishing a planning team, including who should participate on it
- The applicable OSHA regulations pertinent to an emergency preparedness plan
- How best to evaluate the hazards that need to be considered based on the assessment
- A detailed discussion of the basic elements to include in your plan
- Recommendations on the business/organizational recovery strategies to consider and address
- How best to ensure that all employees are accounted for, including those with limited abilities during an event
- Proven ways for training emergency personnel and ensuring that the training is kept up to date and drills are included in the process
- How to best identify and evaluate third-party resources that might be useful in developing your emergency preparedness plan
About Your Speaker
Claud L. (Tex) McIver, Esq., is a partner in the Atlanta office of Fisher & Phillips LLP. In his 30-year career, he has assisted clients nationally and internationally in their compliance efforts involving all federal and state employment laws and has successfully defended employers in more than 200 union-organizing campaigns. He regularly handles contract negotiations, arbitrations, defense of corporate campaigns and the full range of strikes, lockouts, and other interruptions of work.
He has also written widely on employment law subjects and presented speeches and seminars to hundreds of business associations, bar associations, and client groups concerning a broad range of employment law and legislative issues.
McIver has been recognized numerous times for his legal contributions and has been cited as one of the “top legal minds” in Atlanta by Atlanta Lawyer magazine and named one of Georgia Trend magazine’s Legal Elite in 2010 and 2011. He has been listed in Who’s Who Legal USA Management Labour & Employment by the researchers at the International Who’s Who Legal publication and was selected as a Client Service All-Star for 2011 in BTI Consulting Group’s survey where an elite group of attorneys are nominated by in-house counsel for their outstanding client service.
McIver is “AV” Peer Review Rated by Martindale-Hubbell and has been repeatedly selected for inclusion in Georgia Super Lawyers. He has been listed in Chambers USA, America’s Leading Business Lawyers since 2007 and in The Best Lawyers in America since 2006.
How Do Webinars Work?
A webinar is remarkably cost-effective and convenient. You participate from your office, using a regular telephone and a computer with an Internet connection. You have no travel costs and no out-of-office time.
Plus, for one low price, you can get as many people in your office to participate as you can fit around a speakerphone and a computer screen.
Because the conference is live, you can ask the speakers questions—either on the phone or via the webinar interface.
You will receive access instructions via e-mail three days before the event and the morning of the event. Your conference materials will be included in these emails for you to view, print, and download prior to the event. They are also available on the webinar interface when you log in.
If you are ordering online the morning of the webinar please call our Customer Service Department at 1-800-727-5257 to be sure to get your access instructions and handout materials.