by Rose Marie Quintos
A business continuity plan outlines the processes and procedures that will help keep critical functions running — or restore them as soon as possible — in the event of a major disaster, whether it be a natural catastrophic event or a technological disaster, like a cyberattack.
For a business to be viable, four activities must be working:
- communications,
- data processing,
- facilities, and
- critical operations
When a crisis occurs, these functions need to be restored as soon as possible.
Communications
If communications are disrupted, the first step toward regaining control will be a provisional communications system. Communications breakdowns can be intentional, accidental, or caused by a natural disaster, and they can be temporary inconveniences or business-threatening events.
Communications are the link between geographically separated people and between the computers that share data with remote services or databases.
Your Plan is Your Parachute, by Jacques R. Island
Communication is also the key to business continuity management. It is crucial that a business communicates with its employees, vendors, customers, and other stakeholders to ensure that they understand what is going on and why it is important.
If people aren’t told what’s going on or why it matters (for example, if there’s going to be downtime), they won’t be able to react appropriately when disaster strikes.
The way we communicate can have a big impact on how effective our business continuity plans will be:
Communicate clearly. Tell everyone what they need to do during an emergency so they know what they are responsible for – whether it’s closing down production lines or shutting down servers for maintenance purposes. These are things that have a direct impact on other people working at those sites, so everyone must be aware of their roles before an incident occurs. This also includes informing staff about any changes that may occur within departments, as well as updating them on a regular basis to ensure that no one is left behind when emergencies arise unexpectedly.
Data Processing
After communications are restored during a crisis, the next function to be restored is data from backups. Other considerations about data are migration issues, encryption, and security.
Data can be recovered from any device that has gone missing or damaged. Files can be retrieved and restored to another device if all else fails. Data recovery software also works as a backup solution for important documents and images.
The modern enterprise, no matter what its size, lives on information—
it is its blood; it feeds all aspects of a company’s activities.
Your Plan is Your Parachute, by Jacques R. Island
A company cannot function without data, so it is important that the most critical information will be available from duplicate electronic databases and in paper form until normal systems are restored.
Facilities
If the regular office location of the company is temporarily unavailable, it is necessary to have temporary space until the impacted location is restored or until a replacement facility is built.
Natural disasters, criminal acts, civil unrest, or an accident can all limit or prohibit the use of a facility. In many cases, your organization may need to reconstitute itself in a different location.
Critical Operations
Critical operations are the processes that keep your business running. They include things like payroll and inventory management, customer support, manufacturing processes, and more. If these are interrupted for any reason—for example, if a power outage occurs during peak processing time—your company could fail.
One additional advantage of a business continuity plan is that it can also help an organization be tuned up to operate more efficiently.
A business can determine what operations are actually generating income and what are merely supportive, or even irrelevant, by simply identifying and prioritizing its critical operations.
Conclusion
A business should be able to continue operations when a crisis occurs.This requires it to be aware of its own infrastructure and to have a plan in place to keep critical processes running. Business continuity is an ongoing process that requires constant improvement; it is not something you can simply sit back and wait for to happen. If you want to be in control of your business, make sure it has the necessary tools in place so that there are no gaps or holes if disaster strikes.
Rose Marie Quintos is a Publishing Assistant and the Marketing Director for Quest Publishing,a division of the Inquesta Corporation. (She can be reached at rquintos@inquesta.com.)
