Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery Planning

Having the peace of mind your business systems are backed up in the event of failure or any other situation that may cause disruption to your day to day operation is vital for continued business success.

It is becoming more prevalent to have a business continuity plan (BCP) in place, and soon it will become a legislated practice so it is wise to implement one sooner rather than later. Here are some reasons why it is advisable to invest in a BCP for your business:

• one in five organisations will suffer a major incident in the next 5 years
• 80% of companies that suffer a major incident will cease to exist in 18 months
• terrorism is an ongoing threat
• less than 40% of businesses with fewer than 50 employees have a BCP

The Business Benefits of BCDR Planning

The benefits from implementing a BCDR Plan are vast, as ultimately you will be ensuring future success and survival of your operation by reducing the exposure to risks by methodical risk identification, which may help you improve your understanding of each department. Once the risks are identified it will improve operational effectiveness through enforced programmes of business process re-engineering and will give better organisational resilience by designating alternative people to support key processes. Other benefits include protecting both the physical and knowledge assets, preservation of markets by ensuring continuity of supply and overall improvement of security.

So what do you do if your department is at immediate risk and your BCDR Plan hasn't been implemented yet?

If the threat to the business is imminent then you should be looking to partner a company like MSM that specialise in supporting business critical systems. Your BCDR plan needs to cover every aspect of your company's business critical systems at the very least. One solution is to outsource as many key points of failure as possible so thatthe risk is spread and hence reduced. MSM have been helping clients support their disaster recovery and business continuity plans and mitigate DR risks since 1998.

To minimise cost to you we provide support services on a cost plus basis. Typically our support team spend a few days carrying out a system health check/technical audit to learn and document your software, ideally before you need the support. 

Once we have familiarised ourselves with your systems and have remote access, you can invoke your SLA at any time, in accordance with your own BCP.  Charges generally are in the form of a retainer to maintain the team's familiarity, until you need help.  If the risk subsides, our contracts are flexible and so you can cancel without penalty. 

Further Reading
If you are in a current state of urgency or just want to talk to a professional about protecting your business then read further about our BCP service or call us today.