Various subject matter experts at Schneider Electric write a lot of blog posts in the course of a year, so as 2016 comes to an end it’s a good time to look back and see which topics most resonated with readers. In terms of the posts published by the Industrial Power group, it’s clear that the topic of business continuity reigned supreme.

That certainly makes sense given that downtime is anathema to customers in the industrial space. But business continuity goes beyond merely ensuring the power stays on and machines keep humming.

That was clear from our most popular post of the year, Christian Bertrand’s piece titled, “Why You Need a Power Failure Response Strategy.” The post challenges readers to think more broadly about what happens during a power failure in order to come up with an effective strategy for dealing with it. I thought this piece of advice was particularly insightful: “Finally, as you build your strategy, think about how people are going to behave in the various circumstances you predict. While a lot of emergency procedures and processes can be automated at a machine level, unless you’re running a complete lights-out facility, people are going to need to be involved in your power failure response strategy.”

People, of course, will behave differently according to the situations they’re in.

He encourages companies to come up with emergency response plans and then practice them. That’s a step I’m willing to bet many companies don’t take, which means the first time they try to implement the plan is in the face of an emergency. Not good.

Don Strickland’s “5 Keys to Selecting a UPS that Will Ensure Business  Continuity for Critical Industrial Ap...