Sorry We’re Closed Today: Thoughts for Entrepreneurs to Break Free from Your Overwhelming Grid Dependency
Producing electricity on your own isn’t the only way to break free from grid dependency. Start with small and easy?steps.
You’re trying to pay with your Apple watch, but you can’t. Not because you don’t have enough money, but because the payment terminal has no power.
You go back to your house to get some good old cash. Upon returning to the store, the sliding doors don’t open because they too, have no power.
When the grid is down, business is closed.
Irrespective of what your business is.
That’s the hard truth?—?we are overwhelmingly dependent on the grid. So what can entrepreneurs do to decrease their grid dependency, and increase their resilience?
If You Can, Install Rooftop?Solar
Those who read my articles regularly know that I am a big advocate of producing electricity decentrally , using rooftop solar and a solar battery. Even if you drive electric cars, you can reach self-sufficiency of up to 80% at home.
Can you do this for your business, too? Well, if you own your premises, then the answer is yes. Many businesses could increase their resilience by installing rooftop solar and a solar battery, and at the same time reduce their energy costs , which are skyrocketing all around the world.
Does rooftop solar solve all resilience problems for a business? Of course not. If the sliding doors to your store open and your payment terminal works during a power cut, but you have no internet connection, you won’t do any business apart from the cash sales. But building resilience has never been a one-off project, it’s a continuous process.
If You Can’t, Do This?Instead
Many businesses, including my B2B SaaS company, don’t own their premises. So installing rooftop solar is not impossible, but much more difficult. It will need ample discussions with your landlord, building consensus amongst the landlord and all tenants that such a project is viable from both a resilience and a business case perspective.
So I’d suggest you don’t waste your time with discussions with your landlord, but start building resilience step-by-step, without rooftop solar.
Here are some suggestions that can help you get started.
1. No On-Premise Servers and NAS?Systems
It’s surprising how many small businesses still believe that on-premise servers or NAS systems give their files better availability and security than cloud storage. Hey, how would you access your cloud files during a power cut, when you don’t have internet to access the cloud?
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First, there are affordable ways to install a grid-independent backup internet connection. But that’s a story for a different day.
Second, most cloud file storage systems allow automatic offline sync of all files. With today’s personal computers having 1GB+ storage capacity, you can configure all your cloud files to sync to your computer. If you do that before those power cuts kick in, you can continue to work offline and all the changes will be synced back automatically once power is restored, just like when you work offline on a plane.
2. No?Desktops
Recently, one of my employees who is based in South-East Asia, suffered a long power cut in her home, without having a backup internet connection. Instead of being unproductive the whole day, she packed up her laptop, traveled to a friend’s house, and dialed into the video calls from there. In this way, one hour of work was lost and one call was missed, instead of a full day’s work with several calls. All because she uses a laptop instead of a desktop.
My office is where my laptop is. I don’t have an external screen, so I have the same work setup wherever I am. In contrast, in surprisingly many work setups, we still see desktops?—?just because this is how we did things in the past. Replacing them with laptops with batteries adds resilience at very little cost.
3. Decentralize
In many companies, there is a huge debate about whether people should be ordered back into the office, or whether remote work is here to stay.
In our company, we cherish a hybrid approach to work. Everybody who is based in Switzerland must come to the office on Tuesdays and Wednesdays and can work remotely for the other workdays. Everybody who isn’t based in Switzerland works remotely all the time by nature but comes to Switzerland for a full work week three times a year.
Let’s not discuss the pros and cons of remote work here, but look at the resilience aspect of remote work. Being able to work remotely means that you can easily relocate to a different location in case of power outages or other crises. That doesn’t make you immune to power outages and crises, but at least you’re not losing your entire workforce at the same time.
Conclusion
Weaving resilience into the design of your company is a long, step-by-step process. Instead of arguing that my suggestions won’t help in a month-long large-scale power outage, here is my suggestion: Just get started with the first simple steps. Today.
Growing a company ?? in troubled times ???? is a marathon.
As a tech entrepreneur ??, active reserve officer ??, and father of three ??????, I can help you with ?? practical entrepreneurship and resilience advice for all aspects of life. To the point ??, no fluff, because entrepreneurs are busy.
When I’m not busy, I get my rest and inspiration in the beautiful mountains ??? around Zermatt ????.