WHY IMPLEMENT A BUSINESS CONTINUITY PLAN?

Reasons.

There are many reasons why Business Continuity planning is vital. Most individuals would never contemplate not insuring their home or their car. Oddly enough though, many organisations don't take precautions to protect their businesses.

Let's explore some of the common misconceptions before taking a look at key considerations associated with business continuity planning.

It will never happen to me.

The ostrich approach. Denial is sometimes a useful coping strategy but sooner or later something serious is going to happen. There is a growing expectation on the part of customers and other stakeholders that suggests if you are not prepared then ignorance is not a valid excuse!

We're OK, our IT is backed up every day by Frank.

Let's be frank about Frank. You will be surprised how many company directors believe that their IT is the single most important element and that it is protected because they know that someone in the organisation carries out daily backups of their data. Backing up your data is of course key but it's a very small part of protecting your IT systems.

Organisations that have never tested a full recovery of their IT (not just data files) onto another computer system, i.e. simulating the eventuality that the existing systems were destroyed, stolen or inaccessible are really looking for trouble. You will be surprised how many organisations fail to recover their IT in an emergency even though they have taken data backups. And not carrying out such testing across your business processes is just as risky as not testing that you can recover your IT.

Telephony - It's good to talk.

One of the most commonly overlooked areas in our experience is planning for problems with telephony. How will the call centre continue and if you don't have a call centre, how will your customer calls be answered? Have you tested how the telephones will continue and do you have hard copy details of the process and a list of people's contact details held off-site?

The other half of the story - Risk Assessment & Business Impact Analysis.

Good IT & telephony are just half of the story. Implementing an effective Business Continuity plan is not simply about having 'ticks in all of the boxes'.

It's about carrying out a pragmatic Risk Assessment and Business Impact Analysis to be sure that you can implement a plan that not only everyone involved understands and buys into but also properly meets the needs of the business, and does so cost effectively.

To ensure that any solutions you implement meet the needs of the business (and no more) it is important to select a consultancy that is totally independent. This is precisely why Beeches Consulting does not sell hardware, software or facilities solutions: our core business is 'Business Continuity Consulting & IT Recovery Planning'.

This therefore means that we are always clear that our objective is to keep our client's costs to a minimum and when we carry out a risk assessment exercise, we facilitate pragmatic decision making to define a business continuity strategy that meets the needs of the business and not just the available technology. As a company, we have seen far too many 'over engineered' solutions sold to clients by product vendors.

Directors beware - 'A Duty of Care' & BS25999.

Corporate governance, presents a number of other good reasons to implement a plan. Changes to The Companies Act 2006 means that company directors not only have to report annually on risks to the business along with their associated mitigations but they are also required to exercise a duty of care and demonstrate appropriate arrangements are in place to safeguard the business.

The introduction of BS25999 and the expected take-up of certification within the supply chain will mean that companies may well need to implement Business Continuity plans much quicker than expected or else face losing business to their competitors.

And finally...

Don't be one of those organisations that runs the risk that you could lose all or a serious part of your business by failing to implement appropriate Business Continuity plans or failing to test that you can recover things.

Think about how you and your management team would react in an emergency situation. Are you really going to turn to your insurance policy schedule as your answer to managing your way through a problem? And it's unlikely that you can insure against the loss of your whole business.

Unlike insurance, implementing a Business Continuity plan is mostly a one off cost and you can't insure your reputation? Not paying your bills, not answering the phones and not meeting the needs of your customers, even for a short time, can cause damage that's very hard to repair.

Remember also that an independent consultancy such as Beeches Consulting might make implementing a plan 'cost neutral' as we may identify far more cost effective ways of protecting your business than a hardware or software vendor will.

Failing to plan is planning to fail. If you would like to discuss the needs of your own organisation, then please do not hesitate to Contact Us.

 

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