Good planning means they shouldn’t happen.
I do not think I have ever seen anyone as happy as a friend of mine was on the day Swine Flu was declared a global pandemic. My friend, a business continuity manager, thought Christmas had come early – there is nothing like a good pandemic to incite fear into people and force them to plan for disastrous circumstances.
However, disaster recovery (DR) is only a very small part of modern business continuity management. There appear to be some myths surrounding this topic, more now than I have ever come across in my career. Perhaps it is time to start from the beginning and review the definitions and debunk some of those myths.
Business continuity is not the new term for DR. This common misconception is holding a lot of businesses back from developing a comprehensive business continuity management plan. It is not only about backups and how quickly email will be working, it is about your business running smoothly and making sure it can achieve its objectives.
DR is the ambulance; it is a reactive scenario that bundles you up and gets you to hospital to treat your broken leg. It then figures out how long it is going to take you to recover. Business continuity management, on the other hand, is a proactive scenario that figures out how to stop you breaking your leg in the first place. A good business continuity plan is a mitigation service that prevents disaster happening in the first place.
IT and telecommunications are the supporting structures that allow a business to operate. But they are not the only thing to consider when drawing up your business continuity plan. IT systems are responsible for a business’s biggest downtimes. But despite this, business continuity has to be a business-wide approach for it to work.
Board level and management approval of any business continuity plan is important for its success. DR grew from the financial sector and is considered standard in most enterprise businesses. However, in the current economic climate, it is important for every business to consider what factors may prevent it from achieving its objectives. The cost of disruptions, loss of business and downtime impact smaller businesses more significantly than larger enterprises. The best way for a small to medium business to start developing a business continuity plan is to ask staff members what elements of their jobs are critical to the business. You will begin to see what factors have the biggest impact on your business. This is the start of your plan.
A very worthwhile investment at this point would be to have an expert in business continuity come in and start discussing how you might mitigate those impacts. At the most basic level there are two ways to increase productivity: you can either up your outputs or you can decrease your costs. Good business continuity plans can actually tackle both those areas. By minimising your disruptions you can save money, and by streamlining your processes your business continuity plans can increase productivity. In the current economic climate, businesses that are less prepared for the unexpected will suffer immensely.
I am afraid that one backup is not enough and speaking of backups, when was the last time you tested yours? Just because you have them does not necessarily mean they will work in a crisis. I have personally been the victim of that scenario and I can assure you the only thing more frustrating than not having a backup when the “oh no!” moment happens is having one that does not work .Thankfully technology can come to the rescue here. I now keep backups on a separate drive as well as in the cloud. This two-pronged tactic is becoming more common in business and is something you should consider in terms of diversity. Do not be afraid to test backups.It is often very difficult for any business to have a comprehensive and perfected continuity plan.It takes constant effort and examination to keep an eye on an ever-changing business. However, I can assure you, it is worth it to be able to say “that never happened to us”.
Karen Monks:
Karen Monks is a technology strategist with 10 years' ICT experience. She is passionate about emerging and breakthrough technologies and their possibilities. Monks is currently consulting on cloud computing, green IT, social media, innovation management and enterprise collaboration. She balances her Internet addiction through a sustainable lifestyle in the Wairarapa. Monks has a blog, GeekGirl, and can be found at twitter.com/Rdiva. Phone: +64 272 734 553Email: karen@karenmonks.co.nzWeb: www.geekgirl.co.nz
