Business Solutions

Business Solutions

What Is a Business Continuity Plan?

A business continuity plan proactively outlines that steps that you will take in your business to recover from (and in some cases prevent) disasters that may occur. The goal is to analyze potential threats, identify essential areas of the business that need to be focused on first, and clearly outline what should happen to avoid lost revenue or sustained business disruption.

Your Business Continuity is our Priority

BCP involves defining any and all risks that can affect the company’s operations, making it an important part of the organization’s risk management strategy. Risks may include natural disasters—fire, flood, or weather-related events—and cyber attacks.

There are several steps many companies must follow to develop a solid BCP. They include:


Business Impact Analysis: Here, the business will identify functions and related resources that are time-sensitive.


Recovery: In this portion, the business must identify and implement steps to recover critical business functions.


Organization: A continuity team must be created. This team will devise a plan to manage the disruption.


Training:

The continuity team must be trained, completing exercises that go over the plan and strategies.


Checklist: Create a list that includes key details such as emergency contact information.

There are two types of recovery – the painstaking and often incomplete process of piecing your data and equipment back together, and the easier path of virtualization, backups, and restores.

Redundancy & Disaster Recovery Planning

A natural disaster may seem like the biggest threat your business could face, but statistically less likely to occur than hardware failure and human error. Plan for these everyday occurrences and you will already be prepared in the event of a natural disaster.

Common Data Disasters:

  • Hardware failure
  • Human error
  • Software corruption
  • Computer viruses
  • Equipment theft
  • Hardware destruction

Disaster Recovery Planning:

  • Resilient IT server architecture?
  • Co-Location?
  • Hosting?
  • Cloud?
  • Off premise backups?
  • Cyber security?
  • Satellite offices?
  • Remote work
  • Employee safety and awareness?
  • Written procedures?
  • DRP Testing?

Be ready, stay safe.