Despite high-profile return-to-office mandates from the likes of Amazon, AT&T, Dell, and even the US government, many organizations continue to support employees who work remotely. According to a November 2024 Gallup poll, 26% of US workers with remote-capable jobs work outside the office full-time.
Embracing remote work opens the door to having employees located in different parts of the country or different regions of the world — and that makes it more likely that individual employees will be affected by emergencies that occur far from corporate headquarters, ranging from simple power outages to catastrophic storms, wildfires, earthquakes, and other natural disasters.
In the US alone, 90 major weather-related disasters were declared in 2024, according to an analysis of federal data conducted by the International Institute for Environment and Development. The researchers estimate that 137 million Americans — about 41% of the population — live in areas that were under major disaster or emergency declarations last year.
When disaster strikes, employees may be without electricity, internet, or cell service for days or weeks. They may have to evacuate their homes. They may be struggling with the loss of family members, friends, or neighbors.
Just as organizations have disaster mitigation and recovery plans for main offices and data centers, they should be prepared to support remote employees in disaster situations they likely have never encountered before. Employers must counsel workers on what to do, provide additional resources, and above all, ensure that their mental health is attended to.
This may sound like a job for HR — and it is — but it’s IT’s responsibility to make sure remote employees have the tools they need to stay in contact during a disaster, to protect sensitive data on their devices, and to help them get back to work when it’s safe to do so.
Organizations that look after their employees when they need it the most may see benefits in the form of increased engagement, productivity, and retention: Who wouldn’t want to work for an employer that truly cares about your welfare?
We spoke with tech leaders and disaster recovery experts for their advice on how companies can prepare for and support remote employees facing a disaster situation.
Plan for the worst through simulations
Dr. Oliver Schlake, director of the BSE Scholars Program at the University of Maryland and a survival instructor for 40 years, says there is a significant cultural component to disaster preparedness — or the lack thereof.
People often prefer the “hero” over the “person who’s doing the continued maintenance,” he says. For example, people will hail the firefighter who rescues a victim from a burning house, but not the janitor who changes the battery in the smoke detector that helps to prevent the spread of fire in the first place.
As a result of this cultural tendency, organizations under-invest in tools, resourcing, and programs necessary for disaster preparedness. “There’s no ROI on their reliability until [a disaster] happens. And that’s why a lot of organizations cut out those backup systems,” he says.
To avoid this short-sighted thinking, business leaders should prepare well in advance of any disaster. While companies can offer disaster preparedness training in a classroom setting, Schlake recommends hands-on simulations for greater effectiveness. For example, the organization could shut off its intranet or force employees to switch off their usual internet connection to mimic a disaster where connectivity is limited.
Schlake introduces companies conducting these exercises to a decision-making framework called the Rule of Three. “You basically use time intervals of three — three seconds, three minutes, three hours, three days, three weeks, three months — to prioritize your activities in a disaster situation,” he says.
The goal is not for business leaders and employees to respond flawlessly to a simulated disaster. Instead, it is to help them identify gaps they can address before a real crisis occurs.
For example, during an exercise, a B2B organization working with Schlake realized that if its Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) system were disrupted, its employees would be unable to make client calls. To mitigate this risk, the company purchased around 100 burner phones, pre-programmed them, and stored them for emergency use. The foresight paid off: six or seven months later, when a disaster prevented employees from coming on-site, the phones became essential for maintaining client relationships.
Organizations will come to their own unique realizations through these simulations, which should include remote and hybrid workers as well as those who work in the office full-time. If a company discovers it has no means of communicating with remote workers in a power or internet outage, for example, they may decide to outfit those workers with additional communication tools or come up with other contingency plans.
Protect employee devices
Depending on the disaster, a remote employee’s home office may be unavailable: It may have been ravaged by a fire or flood, or they may be under evacuation orders from local or federal authorities.
In such cases, employees who are otherwise unaffected by the disaster may go to coffee shops, libraries, or other public locations to connect to the internet and continue working. These environments make organizations more prone to cyberattacks, says Jocelyn Rhindress, a senior manager in business resource initiatives at the Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB).
During an outage of a Canadian telco in 2022, remote workers had to take this exact risk. “A lot of at-home workers flocked to places — coffee shops and quick-service restaurants — to use their public Wi-Fi,” she says. “So one big problem is just unsafe networks.”
To mitigate this risk, the organization’s IT department needs to make sure that employees are provided with the right tools to protect sensitive information, such as virtual private networks (VPNs), says Kris Lahiri, CSO and co-founder of Egnyte. Like all disaster planning, installing VPNs and other security tools on workers’ laptops should be done well in advance of an actual disaster.
Help with ‘personal disaster recovery planning’
Beyond cybersecurity risks, being forced to leave their home environment presents employees with another significant challenge: the potential loss of personal artifacts, from tax documents and family heirlooms to cherished photos.
Lahiri refers to the process of safeguarding such items as “personal disaster recovery planning” and notes that this aspect of worker support is often overlooked. While companies have experience migrating servers from local offices to distributed teams, few have considered how to support employees on a personal level, he says.
Lahiri urges IT teams to take a more empathetic approach and broaden their scope to include disaster recovery planning for employees’ home offices.
“It’s important for IT to help these people to think, ‘Hey, have you thought of your personal stuff? Like, where do you keep your valuables? Are you making sure that your tax files and other financial info is backed up someplace?’” he says.
Some might see advising employees on personal disaster recovery as beyond the IT department’s role. However, Lahiri argues that this guidance is essential as part of the organization’s broader mandate to ensure employees’ safety and well-being.
Mitigate risks across geographies
Beyond addressing individual employees’ needs, companies must also take a macro view of their workforce to prepare for disasters. As businesses become not only more remote but also more global, understanding employees’ locations becomes crucial.
“As a company, I would monitor where all my remote workers are,” says Schlake from the University of Maryland. The goal is to help companies create contingency plans when a disaster is on the horizon for a particular location.
“When I see there’s a crisis coming up in a certain area, I can take preventive measures,” he says. For example, if a typhoon is approaching the Philippines, a company can plan how it will compensate if, say, 5% of its Philippines-based workforce loses internet access.
To maintain business continuity, companies must pay special attention to business-critical roles. Hiring and training should be approached with a global mindset, allowing for backup workers in different locations to step in when disasters affect specific geographies, says Egnyte’s Lahiri.
Oxfam International takes this kind of strategic approach to workforce management. According to CIO Kenny Kamal, the organization’s mission to fight inequality and end poverty often requires responding to natural disasters and crises worldwide.
“This often means that Oxfam staff and partners are responding while managing the risks to themselves and their own communities,” he says.
To tackle this challenge, Oxfam prioritizes “key operational locations rather than individual endpoints,” Kamal says. This strategy relies on hubs that support hybrid teams in disaster-affected areas. These hubs are equipped with redundant power solutions, backup internet connectivity, and prepositioned resources such as satellite kits and solar-powered chargers.
Building on this foundation, Oxfam develops multiple contingency plans to guide employees in crisis situations.
“To prepare for a range of scenarios, organizations should develop scalable disaster response plans. By categorizing disasters by impact — localized, regional, or wide-scale — teams can follow clearly defined protocols,” he says.
Put employee well-being above all else
Preparing for disasters is a complex challenge that requires companies to focus on agility, redundancy, flexibility, resilience, and business continuity. But employee well-being must remain the top priority.
CFIB’s Rhindress notes that in some locations, such as Canada, health and safety are legally mandated components of any disaster response plan. However, organizations should aim to go beyond mere compliance — starting with effective communication.
“It might come down to sharing your personal cell phone number or making sure there’s a way for your employees to always get in touch with someone,” she says.
Mario Jabbour, Chief Finance & Admin Officer for Project HOPE, a global health and humanitarian organization, echoes this perspective.
“Prioritizing employee well-being with mental health resources and balanced expectations, along with clear policies, training, and disaster response guides, is key to navigating crises effectively,” he says.
Oxfam’s Kamal also advocates for mental health support, flexible work arrangements, and open communication. Since no organization will execute employee support perfectly, he stresses the importance of continuous self-assessment.
“After every disaster response, it’s essential to evaluate what worked and what didn’t. Learning from these experiences allows organizations to refine their plans and strengthen their collective resilience,” he says.
Kamal emphasizes that while disasters are inherently unpredictable, proactive preparation can significantly mitigate their impact. “By focusing on resilience, flexibility, and the well-being of hybrid teams, organizations can empower their workforce to navigate challenges with confidence and continue delivering on their mission when it matters most,” he says.
