by Mark Dunne
When a business decides to underwrite the creation of a business continuity plan, that is one of the smartest moves the management of the company can make. Next to the business plan, the budget and the marketing strategy, a business continuity plan that has been prepared carefully, well understood throughout the organization and tested thoroughly can often assure the business continue their path to success despite anything that might come along to stop the ongoing work of the company.

The project manager put in charge of developing a business continuity plan should not dismiss the scope or the significant investment that must be made by the company to create a plan that has a high probability of working in a crisis situation. A business continuity plan is more than just a report produced by a committee on what the business might do to survive a disaster. The plan is an ongoing and living activity within the business to define any realistic type of business threat and then to devise and test a response to that threat so if disaster strikes, recovery to full business functionality is assured.

The first step of the project management method is to define what goes into a good business continuity plan. The forward of the plan will define every feasible type of disaster or business interruption that could cause the business to cease operation or see a break in the continued supply of goods and services to the customer. This list could get quite long. Anything from a catastrophic fire to an outbreak of disease in the staff to a power outage at the main company plant to many other kinds of business interruptions must be defined in the early parts of your continuity plan.

Once each business interruption has been defined in significant detail, a well researched plan for business resumption and renewal should be defined. The project manager may decide to develop numerous individual disaster recovery plans each one designed to address a specific emergency. The important thing is that in addition to the definition of the potential problem and a plan for recovery, there must also be a plan for implementation , ongoing testing and continuous review of each business continuity plan that has been developed.

The business continuity plan that sets as its objective to represent a complete and realizable plan for business survival cannot focus on just one aspect of the business. The misconception that a business continuity plan is only a computer disaster recovery plan involving backing up data and recovering is far too limited to be of value to the company.

In addition to computer systems, a disaster recovery plan must discuss how to respond to the loss of key personnel or in the event that staff cannot report for work such as a work stoppage or a storm that keeps the workers away. It should also address how to handle the extended illness or death of a key employee. These are not pleasant concepts to consider but the importance having that plan in place supersedes emotional issues relative to a potential crisis.

By thinking of every important aspect of the business and including that element in your business continuing plan, the outcome will be a program or series of programs that have thought of everything needed to make sure the business will continue no matter what happens. It means that if equipment fails, there is a way to turn to backup or borrowed equipment. It means that in addition to offsite storage of computer data and software, the business is constantly securing crucial data in paper form to a disaster cannot destroy that paper trail. It means if you have a supply line of materials for the creation of the product of the company, you have a plan should that supply line be disrupted. This is the kind of thorough job that will give the company a “safety net” that can be trusted to get the business up and running quickly in the event of any disaster that might come along.

Savenet Solutions was established in 2005 and offer managed backup and Disaster Recovery (DR) solution which are secure and reliable system which can be scaled easily from a single server in a start up business to hundreds of servers in a corporate network.

Article Source: PLJMagazine.com