For most small businesses, their greatest asset is also their biggest weakness. Well over half of small businesses would soon cease to function if anything happened to the entrepreneur who is running them. Planning business continuity in those circumstances is always going to be tricky. You can surround yourself with a first-class team, but the leader of the gang is all too often an irreplaceable element.

That risk is, however, in the entrepreneur’s hands. He or she can put in place systems, share workloads and work smarter, all of which will contribute to reducing the reliance on one person. The financial burden that would be felt by the business leader’s dependents and indeed by the firm itself, can, to some extent, be mitigated by suitable insurance policies.

What about the risks that are outside your own hands?

But what about the risks that are outside your own hands? Fire and, in increasing measure, flood are also insurable risks, although whether the level of cover ever really compensates a business is a matter for debate. The loss of business development opportunity and the potentially uncomfortable working conditions whilst the property is repaired are not a lot of fun either.

The modern threats to a business are cyber and terrorist attacks. Ask the businesses in Salisbury how their last six months have been since the Novichok poisoning incidents and I suspect you will be greeted with a rude response. And there is probably nothing that they could have done to prevent this happening; it was entirely outside their control.

Cyber attack is a very real threat to all of us

Cyber attack is a very real threat to all of us. Those who would cause trouble are becoming more and more sophisticated, and the IT fraternity are having to run quite quickly just to keep ahead of them. Appropriate firewalls and anti-malware protections are a must for any computer equipment you use and there is a growing market in cyber insurance. Whilst that might provide some degree of financial compensation, I suspect the aftermath is as unpleasant in its own way as the flood or the fire.

And let’s not even go into the possibility of a combined attack from the terrorist and cyber criminal...