Business Continuity – What’s It All About?
My FREE Introductory Guide To Business Continuity is available to help you. If you are ready to improve your Business Continuity capabilities the FREE Guide will help you get started. Simply contact me by email (putting Free Guide in the subject line) or phone using the boxes to the right and I will send you a copy of the FREE Guide asap and without obligation.
Business Continuity is all about protecting your organisation, particularly across the following areas:-
- the people
- the reputation
- the brand
- the stakeholders
- the operations
- the financial position
- the legal obligations.
A common response to hearing the phrase Business Continuity is that people start to talk about IT. Sure, IT is a critical element in enabling organisations to protect their interests in each of the above areas but Business Continuity is a much broader topic.
Even for the most basic of organisations the following key areas must be addressed:-
1) Business Impact Analysis.
This is a structured approach to answering the question ‘if we stop doing this process or activity, what does it mean to us or our stakeholders?’ The results will be used to decide your Business Continuity priorities and identify your requirements. I have seen lots of different approaches – some very complicated and complex and some very simple and straightforward – so there’s choices available to every organisation.
2) Crisis Management.
How an organisation responds to an incident is critical. We can all cite examples of organisations that didn’t do the right thing and some of them have paid heavily for their mistakes. So, Crisis Management is about being ready and able to respond correctly and in a timely manner when an incident happens. Some simple preparations, techniques, tools and training will go a long way towards helping your organisation respond to and take control of unplanned incidents.
3) Disaster Recovery.
A lot of Business Continuity practitioners consider references to Disaster Recovery as old fashioned and outdated but it’s still worth highlighting the concept because in it’s simplest form it simply means ‘getting things back up and running’ after an incident. So call it what you will but your organisation will need a process to recover the critical capabilities for a range of scenarios. Every organisation’s needs, requirements and expectations are different and will be driven by the results of your Business Impact Analysis.
4) Business Continuity (Recovery).
There will be scenarios that result in your organisation needing to operate differently, perhaps from a different location, at reduced capacity or with alternative working methods. All of this needs to be planned and tested. Let’s take a simple example. A common assumption (I don’t like assumptions) is people saying ‘I can work from home’. Whenever I test ‘working from home’ with organisations it results in a series of action points that require attention and follow up before it can be considered a viable solution.
The points above highlight just the basic elements so depending on the requirements of your organisation these may need to be pursued in more detail and indeed additional elements may need to be addressed in order to achieve the appropriate level of protection your organisation needs.
Business Continuity, like most disciplines, can be taken to several different levels depending on the appetite of your organisation for the topic, the risks your organisation faces and the expectations of your organisation’s stakeholders. There is not a ‘one size fits all’ solution.
I can help you in a variety of ways depending on your requirements at any particular time i.e.
- Presentations on any aspect of Business Continuity
- Workshops on key elements
- Training in the various disciplines
- Testing and exercising of solutions and teams
- Project and programme management for full scale implementation or improvement
- Healthchecks
- Reviews and gap analysis
- Audits
- Advice and consultancy.
Remember, Business Continuity, Crisis Management and Disaster Recovery are high on the list of your stakeholder expectations but are too easily pushed down the Corporate Agenda. Don’t wait to be caught out!
The solutions you require do not need to be complex or expensive so call or email me and I will be happy to discuss how I can work with you to improve your Business Continuity, Disaster Recovery and Crisis Management plans, procedures and capabilities.
Don’t forget to contact me for your FREE Introductory Guide To Business Continuity.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Alan Walker MBCI
Director
AW Continuity Ltd