Posts Tagged ‘business continuity basics’

Start with the basics.

DR/BC planning in small and mid sized businesses (SMB) always starts with the basics.  These are the things that every business should do, regardless of their size, mission, regulatory compliance, or business strategy.  These are the easy things that don’t require gobs of money or consultants to tell you how to protect your business from a debilitating interruption.  When the basics are done well, any business can recover from any unexpected event and / or situation.  The variable is how long and how much effort it will take to recover.  This simple concept is lost on many who pursue BC/DR plans, they focus on the “how long” before they focus on the “if”.  The basics provide the “if”. 

Here are the basics:

Sound Design: A sound design consists of planning for a long lifecycle, selecting the proper technology balancing needs, training and supportability, keeping the setup as close to industry best practices as the business needs allow, and keeping it simple.

 Utilize and test security tools:  Security issues are the most common of technology business interruptions.  Use industry best firewalls, monitoring, backup, and malware tools, follow industry best practices, and test regularly.

 Document it:  Trying to figure out how a broken system was setup wastes valuable time in a technology failure.  Having thorough system documentation in place will allow for better long term planning, faster troubleshooting, and provide a roadmap for recovery in the event of an event.

 Build it to last:  Implementation is the variable that will determine the reliability and predictability of a well designed system.  A well planned and executed implementation will usually run better and longer than a haphazard one.  Good habits, industry best practices, attention to detail, fit and finish are some of the traits that make for a solid implementation.

 Support it well:  If it were a car this would mean keeping the tires properly inflated and rotated, changing the oil, keeping it clean, following the manufacturer’s maintenance schedule, watching the gauges and indicator lights, staying aware of how the car performs through your senses.  Technology is no different; routine maintenance (light and heavy), monitoring, and awareness keep the well designed and implemented system running well through lifecycle.

 If the basics are done well, the organization should have a system that is less susceptible to disruption and have the ability to recover in case that they do.  These steps are generally within reach of any organization.

 The next logical question is how long does it take and this is where the conversation starts to get complicated and people start to get lost in the weeds.  Once the basics are in place, this may be the point to call in the outsiders to assist.