Promoted content: Fire safety is as critical during economic downturns

Organisations that are true to this usually operate more efficiently and have advanced levels of performance. Research shows that businesses that effectively protect assets and personnel are more likely to add value to their business and enhance productivity levels whilst seeing reductions in overall costs. This is aligned with the pursuit of social, economic, and environmental objectives, the triple bottom line (TBL) of operations that embraces the complete value chain.

Robust operations require total commitment to quality management, sustainability issues, environmental responsibility, and operational safety. Unfortunately, in many cases, commitment to safety is only observed when the economy is on an upward trajectory, and resources are plentiful. In an economic downturn, matters are worse as the importance of safety may be diluted as companies go into survival mode and become preoccupied with other business challenges.

Commitment to the Safety of Personnel First 

Aside from the ethical and moral aspects of ensuring a safe environment, safety also plays a part in a number of elements that allow organisations to grow regardless of economic conditions.

One such element is the human resources of a company. Achieving and most importantly, retaining loyalty is easier when employees observe that their company is committed to safety as they feel the company cares, and they are being looked after. They would be more inclined to go the extra mile in challenging times. They identify more willingly with the mission and serve as brand ambassadors, both internally and externally. This approach forms the basis for strong and respectful relationships across all levels of an organisation. And organisations that engage actively with their employees tend to outclass those who do not.

Promote Operational Resilience

Companies and organisations face business continuity challenges daily that, in some cases, prove to have existential repercussions. These include breakouts of fire whether these originate from lightning strikes on premises, electrical malfunctions, human error, arson, and many others that can have catastrophic consequences on production facilities and equipment and, by extension to business continuity and ultimately on the survival of the company.

What is most critical is to have as part of a fire safety plan, a provision to contain fire incidents at source as quickly as possible before suffering irreparable damage. Recovery speed matters exponentially to businesses once a fire is out. It is essentially a race against time to return to normality, but many companies fail to do so because they were not adequately prepared to confront a menacing conflagration.

The lesson to be learned is that fire protection is critical. Preparing well is the insurance for minimal impact on operations and, ultimately, the quickest return to normal operations.

To ensure therefore that your company does not become another statistic, the question to ask is: Does your company have proactive measures and technologies against the potential of business threatening fire incidents?

Riding the Storm

Economic and other crises are never far away. They all, however, eventually go away, allowing for normal operating conditions to return. In this case and referring to ones arising from fire incidents, how well these are weathered depends on how proactive the company's fire protection policy has been. These moments in time become moments of truth, and they communicate to all stakeholders what core values are ultimately important.

Applying safety in all its forms is the foundation for silky smooth organisational functioning, strong relationships, management credibility, teamwork. When an organisation achieves these, its economic impact and resilience are astonishing and can overcome many of the things we might never have thought possible under certain circumstances.

We must remember that although one cannot extirpate the risk of fire nevertheless, the ability to defend against it is defined by how resiliently and effectively core operations and functions are protected. And we should always bear in mind that a company that is unable to protect itself can perish much faster from an unfortunate fire incident than from any transient commercial challenge.

As fire suppression experts, FirePro Business Development Managers, help businesses improve operational safety and resilience by implementing environmentally friendly fire suppression technologies on specific areas of risk.