Comments on: Contingency planning for your freelance business http://blog.philippahammond.net/2009/08/21/contingency-planning-for-your-freelance-business/ Translation, Linguistics and Freelancing in the 21st Century Tue, 31 Jan 2012 15:17:53 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=8220 hourly 1 By: philippa http://blog.philippahammond.net/2009/08/21/contingency-planning-for-your-freelance-business/comment-page-1/#comment-1849 philippa Tue, 15 Feb 2011 17:09:56 +0000 http://blog.philippahammond.net/?p=419#comment-1849 @Terry, you're absolutely right. Contingency planning needs to provide for a variety of possible scenarios, such as those you describe, in order to be effective. I think there are some scenarios that are *almost* impossible to plan for, but others such as internet downtime that have cost-effective, straightforward solutions and it wouldn't be good business planning if we ignored them. There wasn't space to look at further scenarios in this blog post; backing up is the one that always springs to mind first, but I'm sure there'll be more posts on this subject later! @Terry, you’re absolutely right. Contingency planning needs to provide for a variety of possible scenarios, such as those you describe, in order to be effective. I think there are some scenarios that are *almost* impossible to plan for, but others such as internet downtime that have cost-effective, straightforward solutions and it wouldn’t be good business planning if we ignored them. There wasn’t space to look at further scenarios in this blog post; backing up is the one that always springs to mind first, but I’m sure there’ll be more posts on this subject later!

]]> By: Terry http://blog.philippahammond.net/2009/08/21/contingency-planning-for-your-freelance-business/comment-page-1/#comment-1848 Terry Mon, 14 Feb 2011 17:42:10 +0000 http://blog.philippahammond.net/?p=419#comment-1848 I find this thread very interesting, but think it is rather dangerous to confine contingency planning to data backup. There are a number of other things for which one needs a "Plan B" - for example failure of Internet connection, or accident, illness, death of close relatives (or even one's own death - how does your colleague get at the 250-page report you had nearly finished so that he/she can do the last ten pages and prevent a disaster for the client). We all tend to stick our heads in the sand about things like this, but every freelancer needs to consider them. I find this thread very interesting, but think it is rather dangerous to confine contingency planning to data backup. There are a number of other things for which one needs a “Plan B” – for example failure of Internet connection, or accident, illness, death of close relatives (or even one’s own death – how does your colleague get at the 250-page report you had nearly finished so that he/she can do the last ten pages and prevent a disaster for the client). We all tend to stick our heads in the sand about things like this, but every freelancer needs to consider them.

]]> By: Andrei http://blog.philippahammond.net/2009/08/21/contingency-planning-for-your-freelance-business/comment-page-1/#comment-1563 Andrei Sun, 28 Feb 2010 12:09:37 +0000 http://blog.philippahammond.net/?p=419#comment-1563 Philippa, thank you for the great post. As Internet is sill pretty slow and expensive in my country, I have to rely on off-line back-up solutions. I just copy my working files and mail folders on a separate USB hard disk. Philippa, thank you for the great post.
As Internet is sill pretty slow and expensive in my country, I have to rely on off-line back-up solutions. I just copy my working files and mail folders on a separate USB hard disk.

]]> By: Angelica http://blog.philippahammond.net/2009/08/21/contingency-planning-for-your-freelance-business/comment-page-1/#comment-1127 Angelica Sat, 29 Aug 2009 02:58:18 +0000 http://blog.philippahammond.net/?p=419#comment-1127 Hi Philippa, I've been trying Sugarsync all this week and I have to say that I'm loving it! I've been digging a little and found out that apparently the version feature is available only to paid accounts. But at 4.99/month for 30GB, I think it is worth it! :) Hi Philippa,
I’ve been trying Sugarsync all this week and I have to say that I’m loving it! I’ve been digging a little and found out that apparently the version feature is available only to paid accounts. But at 4.99/month for 30GB, I think it is worth it! :)

]]> By: Kate Lambert http://blog.philippahammond.net/2009/08/21/contingency-planning-for-your-freelance-business/comment-page-1/#comment-1122 Kate Lambert Fri, 28 Aug 2009 12:57:57 +0000 http://blog.philippahammond.net/?p=419#comment-1122 Thanks Philippa and Iwan. My current business folder is 6 GB, that's 2 years' worth, so I was looking at their 10GB option. It is only the first back-up that's long and I don't mind leaving it to do it over a weekend, I just didn't want to start it off and then go on holiday for a month. I also have another folder containing all work since I started translating in 1996 up to July 2007 but that's another 10 GB and I might put that on a separate hard drive and store it offsite instead as it's not so critical. Thanks Philippa and Iwan. My current business folder is 6 GB, that’s 2 years’ worth, so I was looking at their 10GB option. It is only the first back-up that’s long and I don’t mind leaving it to do it over a weekend, I just didn’t want to start it off and then go on holiday for a month.

I also have another folder containing all work since I started translating in 1996 up to July 2007 but that’s another 10 GB and I might put that on a separate hard drive and store it offsite instead as it’s not so critical.

]]> By: philippa http://blog.philippahammond.net/2009/08/21/contingency-planning-for-your-freelance-business/comment-page-1/#comment-1089 philippa Mon, 24 Aug 2009 08:14:42 +0000 http://blog.philippahammond.net/?p=419#comment-1089 Hi Angelica, You're absolutely right - https://www.sugarsync.com/products/online_backup/online_backup_versioning.html This must be a new feature of Sugarsync, and I'm really pleased you pointed it out! Hi Angelica,

You’re absolutely right – https://www.sugarsync.com/products/online_backup/online_backup_versioning.html This must be a new feature of Sugarsync, and I’m really pleased you pointed it out!

]]> By: Angelica http://blog.philippahammond.net/2009/08/21/contingency-planning-for-your-freelance-business/comment-page-1/#comment-1086 Angelica Mon, 24 Aug 2009 02:22:13 +0000 http://blog.philippahammond.net/?p=419#comment-1086 I had not heard of Sugarsync until now, but it looks really really good! Thanks for the suggestion. I only do daily backups to an external drive every night, but after having my main HD fried twice by power outages I'm always worrying about what would happen with "today's works before the next backup", so this method really hits the nail. I'm just wondering about one thing though: I read in Sugarsync's website that they store 5 previous versions of one's sync'ed files, so it's not clear to me why you were not able to retrieve them. Maybe I'm missing the small print? I had not heard of Sugarsync until now, but it looks really really good! Thanks for the suggestion. I only do daily backups to an external drive every night, but after having my main HD fried twice by power outages I’m always worrying about what would happen with “today’s works before the next backup”, so this method really hits the nail. I’m just wondering about one thing though: I read in Sugarsync’s website that they store 5 previous versions of one’s sync’ed files, so it’s not clear to me why you were not able to retrieve them. Maybe I’m missing the small print?

]]> By: Iwan http://blog.philippahammond.net/2009/08/21/contingency-planning-for-your-freelance-business/comment-page-1/#comment-1082 Iwan Sun, 23 Aug 2009 14:20:37 +0000 http://blog.philippahammond.net/?p=419#comment-1082 This page on the Zen site http://www.zen.co.uk/DataBackup/Products/offline-services.aspx explains that you can do the first backup offline - they send you a USB hard disk (or you send them one of your own). The alternative is to archive your old data (e.g. all work older than 6 months) yourself, to DVDs or another hard disk, and restrict your initial upload to the last 6 months' data. For me, that would be around 2.5GB of data (which I could probably compress further) which would take around 12 hours to upload, according to Zen's figures. This page on the Zen site http://www.zen.co.uk/DataBackup/Products/offline-services.aspx explains that you can do the first backup offline – they send you a USB hard disk (or you send them one of your own).

The alternative is to archive your old data (e.g. all work older than 6 months) yourself, to DVDs or another hard disk, and restrict your initial upload to the last 6 months’ data. For me, that would be around 2.5GB of data (which I could probably compress further) which would take around 12 hours to upload, according to Zen’s figures.

]]> By: philippa http://blog.philippahammond.net/2009/08/21/contingency-planning-for-your-freelance-business/comment-page-1/#comment-1065 philippa Fri, 21 Aug 2009 17:08:06 +0000 http://blog.philippahammond.net/?p=419#comment-1065 Hi Kate, I'm on the ZenVault Express package at the moment, but may need to upgrade at some point. 44 hours? That's crazy! I don't remember it taking that long for my first back-up. It takes about 10 minutes or so for my daily scheduled back-ups. FWIW, Zen's support is very good so it might be worth giving them a call. Hi Kate,

I’m on the ZenVault Express package at the moment, but may need to upgrade at some point. 44 hours? That’s crazy! I don’t remember it taking that long for my first back-up. It takes about 10 minutes or so for my daily scheduled back-ups.

FWIW, Zen’s support is very good so it might be worth giving them a call.

]]> By: Kate Lambert http://blog.philippahammond.net/2009/08/21/contingency-planning-for-your-freelance-business/comment-page-1/#comment-1064 Kate Lambert Fri, 21 Aug 2009 17:03:28 +0000 http://blog.philippahammond.net/?p=419#comment-1064 Which package are you on with Zen? I was about to sign up for ZenVault before I went on holiday but stopped when it said it would take 44 hours to do the first backup, as it wouldn't have finished before I left. It's on my list of things to do when I get back, which is now, so thanks for reminding me. At the moment I just backup to a separate hard drive at the end of the day but I do worry about fires, floods or a thunderstorm zapping every electrical device in the house. Which package are you on with Zen? I was about to sign up for ZenVault before I went on holiday but stopped when it said it would take 44 hours to do the first backup, as it wouldn’t have finished before I left. It’s on my list of things to do when I get back, which is now, so thanks for reminding me. At the moment I just backup to a separate hard drive at the end of the day but I do worry about fires, floods or a thunderstorm zapping every electrical device in the house.

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