• Tired of running on the pricing merry go round and frustrated at having to compete on price only?
• Want to concentrate on good clients, not bad ones?
• Want to get results with your marketing message?
• Want to increase your sales and profits?
  Hear how you will be able to:
• Establish your very own Market Dominating Position
• Define your ideal target client with laser precision
• Attract profitable clients and discourage unprofitable ones
• Know what to do and where to start identifying areas of growth
  ​

Alberta small business marketing guru, Derryl Kostynuik of PowerByMarketing.com, will share a few marketing strategies that you can immediately implement in your business. Join us Thursday, May 31 from 11:45 am to 1 pm at the Best Western Hotel in Airdrie.

This week at Think Airdrie Networking. Charlene Gize from A-WIN Insurance will be in the house giving you all the latest changes in the insurance world. Want to know more about Home, Auto, Business insurance policies? What's covered and what's not covered? This will be your chance to ask your questions. Join us Thursday May 24 at the Best Western Hotel, Airdrie from 11:45 am to 1 pm.
First time dropping in, your lunch is in TAN. Second time dropping in $10. Subsequent drop ins are $15.

​Allan Marston will be presenting All you need to know about BitCoin. Allan's passion and expertise in Bitcoin and Cryptocurrencies have had him invited to speak on the subject at numerous international conferences.

Bitcoin is the Internet's currency and Cryptocurrencies will change the way we deal with money. Allan will show us the basics in an easily understandable presentation.

If you are curious about digital currency, then you will want to hear this. Join us this Thursday, May 17, from 11:45 am to 1 pm. To reserve your seat click this link https://bit.ly/2peAZ7J

Heather Douglas presented on the up coming legalization of Marijuana. While there are still a few items that are still being determined by the Government employers need to make sure they are ready.

What is the impact of impairment in the workforce?
As am employer you need to create and implement a plan. Consider what the hazards would be within your business.
It is the duty of the employer to accommodate workers with medical conditions + disabilities: It is the responsibility of the employee to self disclose any medical conditions and disabilities.
 
Employers will need to become aware of what impairment looks like.
What are some of the Impairment effects
Dizziness, impaired memory, suspiciousness, impaired motor skilled, dry mouth, worsening of seizures, hypersensitivity, higher or lower blood levels, nausea, fast heartbeat.
The above effects could last in your system for as long as 24 hours.
 
Heather high recommends that employers work with employees to create a policy around use and establishing a safe work environment. This way everyone involved understands what is expected of everyone.

Think Airdrie Networking would like to thank the Executive Members of our 2015-2016 session.  They did an amazing job!  This year TAN has:

- Sponsored the Airdrie Angel Program
- Sponsored an Entrepreneur with this year's SMARTStart program
- Hosted several FUNtastic, Off The Clock Networking events at some stellar venues throughout Airdrie.
- Participated, Donated or Assisted in various Local Fundraisers & Events.

We've learned about:
- Health Spending Accounts
- How to optimize your credit rating if you're self employed and seeking a Mortgage
- Demystifying SEO
- Marketing Strategies
- Mental Health Resources
- Networking Do's & Don'ts
- Small Business Lobbying... just to name a few.

We've brainstormed and collaborated on various topics like:
- Managing a Bad Review on Social Media
- How to avoid Client Cancellations
- Work/Life Balance
- Employee Recruitment & Retention
- Blogging
- Business Development... etc.

It's been a great year with an amazing and fun group.  Thank you to everyone who presented and/or contributed.  The gift of your time and expertise is what makes our lunches so informative and enjoyable.

*Don't forget that we have 1 session left for the Health Foundation before we break for the summer.  After that, we look forward to seeing everyone again in the fall.

Cheers!
The 2015-2016 TAN Group

This past week we had Clayton Falk with Effective Solutions presenting on "How to choose the right Mental Health Practitioner".  To help navigate and better understand all the options out there we've included a PDF of his presentation.  If you have any questions (whether for yourself or on behalf of a loved one) please remember that it never hurts to ask.

Contact: Clayton Falk
Airdrie Counselling Centre
#5, 620 1st Ave N.W.
Airdrie, AB T4B2R3
Canada
Phone: (403) 703-7025
E-mail: clayton@effectivesolutionscounselling.com

Business Continuity Planning – Are you ready?
By Michael Curtis – President of The Response Team Inc.

Why is it that your business should be thinking about a business continuity plan?  Well quite simply – “stuff” happens.  Sometimes that “stuff” is within our control but some of the time it is not. First of all I think that we should define a couple of terms:

A Business Continuity Plan enables critical services or products to be continually delivered to clients and endeavors to ensure that critical operations continue to be available.

The Disaster Recovery Plan is a subset, a small part of overall business continuity. It is the process of saving data with the sole purpose of being able to recover it in the event of a disaster. 

A Business Resumption Plan describes how to resume business after a disruption.

These three plans are quite different from one and other.  If you have questions about them please get in touch with me and I would be happy to walk you through them and the processes involved in them.

So what is this “Stuff” that I refer to?  These are the hazards that we face every day and how they could impact our businesses.  Generally these hazards are identified in the risk analysis (Which I will talk about later).  These risks are generally broken down into two distinct groups and are identified as either natural or human caused.

Natural hazards may include the severe weather phenomenon that we are aware of, such as: severe bad weather including high winds, hail, tornadoes, hurricanes, floods, forest fires, earthquakes, epidemics, and tsunamis.

Human caused hazards can be broken down into two categories as well: intentional and non-intentional.

Non-intentional human caused hazards include: construction of failures (roads, bridges, water systems, etc.), Power or energy failures, explosions and fires, hazardous materials spills, financial issues, etc.

Intentionally caused human hazards include: civil disobedience, work action or stoppages, sabotage, terrorism, etc.

While this is just a short list, and any incident, emergency, or disaster may provide minor or significant impacts to any organization and their ability to continue business. This is why we need to have a plan in place ahead of time.

Business continuity management is not a new topic. However many people misunderstand what’s involved in business continuity management. My experience has taught me that business continuity management can actually be thought of as an umbrella. The umbrella can be thought of as the overarching and encompassing combination of the following components:

1.       Risk management
2.       Disaster Recovery
3.       Facilities Management
4.       Supply Chain Management
5.       Quality Management
6.       Health and Safety
7.       Knowledge Management
8.       Emergency Management
9.       Security
10.   Crisis Communication and Public Relations

Do not let this list overwhelm you. The vast majority of companies do not have a solid grasp on all 10 components. So what steps can you take? What’s involved you may ask? While there are six steps in completing a business continuity plan. They include:

1. Risk Management (or Risk Assessment)
2. Business Impact Analysis
3. Business Continuity Strategy Development
4. Business Continuity Plan Development
5. Business Continuity Plan Testing
6. Business Continuity Plan Maintenance

I will go through the steps of a couple of these in this blog. The risk management staff or risk assessment enables your organization to determine:

a)      What incidents can occur
b)      How often they are likely to occur
c)       The damage and incident is likely to cause
d)      How will an incident likely affect the organization
e)      How vulnerable the organization is to the hazard

Once the risk assessment is completed and we have a better understanding of the hazards that the organization may face we need to turn to the business impact analysis. The business impact analysis (BIA) is the assessment of the impact of a disruptive event on the business and the importance of that business function as it applies to your mission.  In other words it will identify:

•      Which business areas are critical to the your business survival
•      Time imperatives on the delivery of products and services
•      RTO – Recovery Time Objectives
•      MTO – Maximum Tolerable Outages
•      Who is involved both internally and externally in the achievement of the business objective  (Dependencies)
•       Minimum Resource requirements.

The BIA will assist in identifying the quantitative and qualitative impacts of a negative event:

Quantitative: Financial in nature (Sales, property loss, penalties, unexpected expenses

Qualitative: Operational or Non-Financial (Loss of Staff from this point in the process, low morale, reputation or credibility, customer relations etc.

From this point in the process we will begin to develop the strategies necessary to combat the effects of the most likely incidents to affect your organization.  Once those strategies are in place we can begin to put together the plan which will help drive how you will implement these strategies if an incident were to occur in your organization.

Once the plan is in place it is important to test the plan. Testing can occur on small or large scales depending on the needs of the organization. As testing of the plan occurs your organization will soon determine what levels of maintenance need to occur on the plan.

Maintenance should occur on a yearly basis at minimum, so as to incorporate changes in your business as they occur including personnel, location, buildings affected, expansion, contraction, or changes in significant business processes.

One of the significant steps that you will notice in the process is that as you move outside your comfort zone, what was once the unknown and frightening becomes your new normal.

Our Vision: Providing you peace of mind –               A sense of calm.

  It is normal to be concerned and in some cases afraid of the unknowing certainties that lie ahead. With the assistance of professionals in the field of business continuity management and emergency management response, we can help bring those concerns to a manageable level. At the response team Inc. our mission is to provide you with timely, professional, and responsible direction and manpower before, during, and after an incident. It is our vision to provide you peace of mind - a sense of calm.