Business downtime might not be a term many people are familiar with and no, unfortunately, it doesn’t mean everyone will be taking a break from work to enjoy themselves.
You will be taking a break from work but not by choice.
Business downtime is what happens when there is a failure in some way which means employees won’t be able to carry on with their duties as normal. Business downtime can be caused by a wide assortment of different issues but the main categories are hardware failures, network failures, human error and outside issues like the weather or other natural phenomena.
The effects of business downtime are always going to have a negative impact on your business. Even if you manage to identify the cause of the problem and repair it quickly even a small period of downtime can have huge ramifications for your business.
With businesses across a wide assortment of different industries becoming increasingly digitally focused the dangers of downtime are becoming more and more serious. To confound this problem even further identifying the cause of business downtime isn’t always easy.
Many people have utilised power factor correction for just this purpose. Power factor correction services are available from numerous sources including Johnson & Phillips who are one of the leading professionals in intelligent solutions for power services.
Power factor correction won’t combat all the possible causes of business downtime but it is an effective way to help prevent some of the most common causes of it. So, it is definitely worth pursuing if you have suffered business downtime due to hardware and network issues.
Below let’s look at the main causes of business downtime and see how each can be managed and successfully combated. As I mentioned earlier the main causes of business downtime are hardware failures, network failures, human error, and outside phenomena. Let’s take a more in-depth look at each of these four categories.
Hardware Failures
Hardware failures are the most common cause of business downtime and one of the most expensive to repair. To help combat this many businesses use techniques like power factor correction to better increase the reliability of equipment and your business’s network.
As a helpful bonus power factor correction also helps equipment run more efficiently and effectively as well so it can even help you save money on your electrical bills as well. With an effective power factor correction strategy, you can optimise the lifespan of your electrical equipment and reduce operational downtime.
Power factor correction won’t totally prevent hardware failures for occurring but it will certainly help reduce the risk. If left unchecked hardware failures can be a problem that keeps occurring, again and again, leading to longer periods of business downtime. So, by utilising innovative strategies like power factor correction you can get a handle on the problem.
Network Failures
Second only to hardware failures when it comes to business downtime is network failures. The need to be online is pretty much a necessity in today’s always-online digital workplace but that means a network failure is going to be a big problem.
In some ways, a network failure can be more exasperating than a hardware issue because you will still have some limited functionality in most cases but not enough to actually operate to maximum efficiency. Many businesses rely on a strong and stable network connection to keep standard operations ongoing and when they lose it their business will suffer periods of operational downtime.
Combating the issue of network failures can be a little tricky because network failures can have such a wide spectrum of possible causes. Power factor correction can help to ensure it isn’t a hardware issue affecting the network but it could also be a security issue or be caused by aging equipment.
Human Error
We all make mistakes, don’t we? That in and of itself isn’t usually a huge issue even the most careful and efficient employee will make a mistake at some point and mistakes that can cause a substantial period of business downtime are quite rare.
But rare or not they can still happen and this is an issue that can be difficult to fully combat. A simple mistake from someone could cause you to lose your network connection and it could be as simple as someone pressing the wrong button on a keyboard or accidentally knocking a wire somewhere.
Sometimes these human errors are completely outside your control as it could be someone hundreds of miles always who causes it and it then as a knock on effect. Actually finding out the person responsible could be very difficult as well especially in larger businesses and organisations.
Human errors will always happen but you can reduce them be prioritising the need for careful working and having clear and simple guidelines for work whenever possible. Having a clear recovery plan will also be a big help because it will mean when an error does happen you will be able to act quickly.
Outside/ Natural Phenomena
Finally, let’s look at the last potential cause for business downtime this is usually going to be the most serious and the one that many businesses simply won’t be able to do anything about. However, thankfully it is also by far the least common so you might never experience it.
There is a lot of range to how this category could affect your business something like an earthquake (even a small one) could have a huge impact on your business but something like a power cut or blackout due to an issue like extreme weather is something you might be able to manage yourself.
A good power factor correction service/ strategy could actually help you get your business back up and running again in this situation. The seriousness of the phenomena is what will have the largest impact on this category and for many businesses, you will just have to wait till you have the all-clear before you can get your business set up again.
