Business Continuity Planning & Disaster Recovery

The terms Business Continuity Planning and Disaster Recovery can be considered as two ends of a spectrum which meet and overlap in the middle although the terms themselves are often used interchangeably. Business Continuity Planning emphasises the steps that should be taken in order to avoid a Disaster occurring but then formalises processes for recovering should such a Disaster occur.

The subject is of extreme importance and amazingly, many businesses simply do not take it into account in their day-to-day operations and this, given that 90% of businesses that lose data in a disaster are forced to shut within 2 years!*

MLR can help you with your Business Continuity Planning (BCP) and ensure that you have good systems prepared for Disaster Recovery (DR) should it ever be required. We are well placed to assist you with the IT side of the process.

In determining how much to invest in BCP and DR there are some key points to be considered:

Data

Company data is extremely valuable and as such it should be:

• Protected – physical and electronic protection to avoid a Disaster
• Recoverable – after a recovery, data backups need to accessible
• Available – it must be possible to quickly take possession of the data
• Restorable – backup data must be usable

Questions

• What is the absolute maximum length of time that you can be without email?
• What is the absolute maximum length of time that you can be without access to data documents?
• How much recent historical data can you afford to lose (none, a day’s worth?)
• How much can you afford to spend in achieving these targets?

Options

Although recovering from any significant disruption of an IT network is always extremely inconvenient, the key consideration is at what point such inconvenience becomes unacceptable balanced with the cost of reducing the time taken.

It is important that that the real costs of not taking suitable precautions is balanced against the cost of preventing or preparing for such events. Generally speaking, the more robust the system and the least down-time allowable, the greater the costs.

How much would it cost politically and financially to be without key services for

• 1 hour?
• 4 hours?
• 8 hours?
• 24 hours?
• 3 days?