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Ready, Respond, Recover:  Business Disaster Preparedness

 

TESTIMONIALS:

• Participant and Presenter Quotes

• Expert Video Commentary

• Kenny Osborne's virtual tsunami
   
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Here's what a few past participants have to say about "Ready, Respond, Recover":

"Better than I ever thought it would be…This is great!"

"This was very informative. Honesty, I thought I would excuse myself partway through, but I found this so interesting. I called and changed my plans so I could stay."

"Very informational. Thank you."

Learn what experts have to say about "Ready, Respond, Recover" and the importance of business planning:

"The Ready, Respond, Recover conference provides expert advice on how to survive a natural disaster whether it be a storm like we had in December 2007, an earthquake, a tsunami, or the influenza virus that has swept through the nation. Any of these types of disasters can have a huge impact on a business if you are not prepared and don’t have the knowledge to survive these types of incidents, your business is much less likely to succeed in the future…It’s not an issue of if these disasters will occur, it’s an issue of when. When business owners are prepared, everyone is that much better off." - Jon Kaino, Pacific County Commissioner

"I want to stress really hard that it is important that you do a plan because for the first three, four, five hours you are on your own. Don’t rely on the state, or the county, or the city, because everyone else is trying to figure out what to do too. Phones are down. And you have to get resourceful on how to make things work. So, it is really, really important to have a plan in place….This thing [Dennis Company's disaster plan] was tremendous to have because it kept us up and running. We never did close any of our stores. " - Randy Dennis, Vice-President, Dennis Company

"[You need to prepare your] data so that you can recover data in a disaster. Crazy statistics – 43% of people lose data over the course of their lifetime without a [natural] disaster. 80% of companies who lose a catastrophic amount of data don’t ever recover. It ends up closing their company." - Keleigh Schwartz, Owner, beachdog.com, talking about Offsite Data Storage

"I hope that each business and each individual can develop their own communications plan with assistance from emergency management agency, through this particular forum. In particular, businesses will be able to resilient in terms of their planning. And ready to respond and recover for any kind of event that should happen." - Stephanie Fritts, Pacific County Emergency Management Director

"We’re talking about the things that all business owners should put in place – the actions that they should go through – to make sure that they can recover from a disaster…A lot of times, we are there to help pick up the pieces. One of the things that we do is we use our financials. If business owners get in the habit of giving their financials to their banker ahead of time, before there is a need, then we can help them recover." - Andy Mesojednik, Vice President, Bank of the Pacific

"We work within our own communities almost too much – law enforcement is focused on criminal issues. These [business resiliency] conferences give us a chance to expand into the greater community and hear from our constituents about the issues that they are dealing with in the business community, which mirror issues that we deal with." - John Didion, Pacific County Sheriff

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EXPERT VIDEO COMMENTARY

Mike Peroni, owner, Boistfort Valley Farm

Organic farmer, Peroni, shares his personal experiences with disaster and its impacts, as well as a cautionary message: we're all at risk.

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Randy Dennis, Vice-President, Dennis Company

Dennis shares insights on the challenges businesses face in the minutes and hours after disaster and the importance to planning ahead to survive.

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Stephanie Fritts, Pacific County Emergency Management Director

Fritts shares insights on lessons learned in disaster communications, and how businesses need to plan communications to be able to survive in a disaster situation.

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Keleigh Schwartz, Owner, beachdog.com

Schwartz discusses data storage, and offers some eye-opening statistics on business closures due to data loss.

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Andy Mesojednik, Vice President, Bank of the Pacific

Mesojednik shares insights on planning ahead for access to capital in the face of disaster, as well as the importance of keeping and sharing good financial records.

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John Didion, Pacific County Sheriff

As a long-time law enforcement officer and first-responder, Didion shares thoughts on the importance of business and government collaboration for community preparedness.

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Wendy Freitag, Special Assistant to the Director - Corporate Relations, Washington State Military Department, Emergency Management Division

Freitag discusses business resiliency following natural or man-made disasters.

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Shelly Pollock, Financial Advisor, NW Insurance & Financial

Insurance professional Pollock talks about how most people aren't covered in case of disability.

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Jon Kaino, Pacific County Commissioner, Washington State

Kaino discusses the importance of business preparedness and collaboration in the face of man-made or natural disasters, and why Pacific County-based and other businesses need to plan ahead and participate in Ready, Respond, Recover.

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Kenny Osborne's Virtual Tsunami

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