In this modern day and age, being online for a business is becoming more and more common place. And with more and more businesses making better use of online resources to streamline their workflow the threat of cyber attacks becomes more and more prevalent. Small businesses may think that hackers mainly target bigger companies however, this couldn’t be further from the truth. Most hackers target small businesses because of comparably less security than the bigger companies. However, this is not even the only reason why you should have a business continuity plan as it can also help to mitigate damages from events like floods, fires and thefts.
What is business continuity?
Business continuity is, in the event of a work stopping circumstance such as a cyber attack, finding a way for your business to continue operations.
A business continuity plan outlines the whole process of your business quickly rebuilding from the unforeseen circumstance to a point where you can continue working. Everyone must be aware of the procedure for their department and their involvement in the strategy because it includes every aspect of your company.
A common misconception s that a business continuity plan and a disaster recovery plan are just the same thing however, this is not the case however as a disaster recovery plan is to help rebuild and restore the infrastructure not to help business operations continue.
You must confront hard concerns like, “Can you restart manufacturing, sales, and support so the business can continue to run after the disaster?” Where will they work, for instance, if the roof of the office where your customer care department is located leaks and everything soaked and unusable? What about at their houses? Will they be able to answer phone calls from customers in some way? These worries are clearly addressed in your business continuity strategy.
An often overlooked part of a business continuity plan is the business impact analysis section. The business impact analysis quantifies the effects of a sudden loss of business operations; this type of analysis will offer you the knowledge you need to make some important choices. For example, many people wonder whether they should outsource non-core tasks in their BC plan. Inadvertently segmenting your company into a value offering in the BIA section gives you the ability to prioritise.
Why business continuity is important
Business continuity plans are paramount in this day and age to help mitigate loss. The most detrimental loss that your business could suffer in the event of a disaster is loss of customers and or customer relationship. On the other said of this there is no better way to show the quality of your business that by managing to still provide at least a chunk if not all of your services in the face of unforeseen circumstances. This will really show your clients that they can rely on you.
For the majority of businesses, restoring IT is a crucial task. Disaster recovery solutions have flooded the market as a result; IT can implement them, but what about everything else?
Although you have cutting-edge technology, your business actually depends on its people and operational procedures. As we mentioned before, addressing accidents well can increase client confidence in your business. They become more certain that you can take the necessary steps to provide a high-quality and secure service.
How a business continuity plan is put together
If you have no business continuity already and you are starting from nothing you should begin by assessing all of your business processes and identify which parts of that process are weak, then calculate your potential losses if those operations are interrupted for various lengths of time.
The next step is to start developing a plan. There a six key areas to look at when doing this:
- Identify the scope of the plan – What extent are you planning? It makes sense to be as thorough as you can because it serves no purpose to focus on one aspect of the business only to find that later on another aspect of the business has an impact on that plan, forcing you to adjust it, nevertheless.
- Identify key business areas – Specifically the intersections; for instance, the areas where sales and manufacturing overlap.
- Identify critical functions. Which procedures are crucial to your company’s daily operations?
- Identify dependencies between various business areas and functions – Knowing the extent of the reliance makes it clear how crucial it is to resume operations.
- Determine acceptable downtime for each part of the business – Of course, some will be essentially zero because there can be no downtime, but others can be tolerated for a few days.
- Create a plan to maintain operations. What policies must be in place if you want to stay in business?
A checklist listing supplies and equipment, the location of the plan and who will be keeping it, the location of data backups (on site or in the cloud), and the contact information for emergency responders and key personnel who can assist is one tool we would suggest using for business continuity planning.
As we mentioned before, you should also create a disaster recovery strategy as part of your business continuity plan. Although you may already have one in place, you must ensure that it meets company demands and guarantee restoration timeframes before assuming it is completely functional. Because of this it is good practice to align your disaster recovery plan with your business continuity plan.
Use your talented team to identify the essential components of the company and what need extra care and attention. You don’t have to do this alone. Once you start people talking, they enjoy sharing their stories of mistakes they’ve made and how they remedied them. Over time, this knowledge may prove to be priceless.
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We’re a young, fun, and enthusiastic bunch of down-to-earth people that strive to relieve our clients’ IT headaches. We love to engage and create enjoyable relationships with our clients, but, ultimately, we’re here to help your business to run smoothly and securely.
If you need help with the creation of your business continuity plan, our team of IT experts are happy to help. Contact us now to find out more or for any of your other IT related queries or needs.
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