Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity

Since all risks cannot be eliminated, it has become more important than ever for organizations to create disaster recovery and business continuity plans.

In recent years, disruptive events have ranged from natural disasters such as hurricanes and wildfires to stolen data via breaches and cyber-attacks.

This past year has even seen the specter of a horrific global pandemic. In fact, COVID-19 has forced organizations to rethink their disaster recovery and business continuity strategies as many companies have been forced to support employees working remotely.

Business continuity planning should cover every possible aspect of a business. This includes areas such as:

• Business partners and suppliers — How can suppliers continue their work with the company if lines of communication or road transport is unavailable?
• Human resources — How can critical staff continue performing their work if, for example, workstations are destroyed or there is no internet connection?
• Business processes — How can a process continue working even if critical equipment or supplies were missing?

Businesses can choose from a variety of disaster recovery methods, or combine several.

A crucial aspect of business continuity disaster recovery plan (BCDR) is how an organization recovers lost data from a backed up second location after servers go down because of a cyber-attack, natural disaster or simply equipment failure. In other words, disaster recovery is highly dependent upon the replication of data and computer processing in an off-premises location not affected by the disaster.

An organization should be in a position to transfer its computer processing to its protected remote location in order to continue operations.

Organizations need a BCDR plan in place and make sure all key officers know about it and how to implement it if the need arises.

Also consider disaster recovery software. There are benefits of having a disaster plan in place including DR software. First, there’s cost savings. Planning for potential disruptive events can save businesses hundreds of thousands of dollars and even mean the difference between a company surviving a natural disaster or folding.

Another benefit is the faster recovery time when effective plans and software are in place.

Depending on the disaster recovery strategy and the types of disaster recovery tools used, businesses can get up and running much faster after a disaster, or even continue operations as if nothing had happened.

Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity Courses by Tonex

Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity training courses, seminars and workshops prepare participants with the skills to identify mission-critical continuity needs, sources of risk,  response and recovery, team charter, hazard exposures, risk assessments, evacuation plans and supply kits, organizational resilience and tools to implement a Business Continuity Management System (BCMS).

For more information, questions, comments, contact us.