Why business continuity management plans fail – and how to get them right
Most businesses that claim to be prepared for the worst, are ready but only in the sense that they would do something different from normal, The essence of good continuity, however, is that everything is planned in advance down to the smallest detail such that there is no need to think when something goes wrong.
There are numerous reports on the actual percentage of companies who have plans and none of them make pleasant reading. The statistics run from 50 to 70 % that have no full plans and if we add ‘tested and current plans’ we would probably find that at least 80% of all European businesses are exposed.
There are sufficient regulatory texts in place and the catch-all of ‘due diligence’ so it cannot be that this situation is deliberate.
The key to business continuity management (BCM) is simplicity combined with planning for keeping the key parts (not all parts) of the business running at service levels customers accept. This service level can be much less than customers contracted for if the right measures are taken in terms of communications. BCM should aim at doing as much preplanning as possible for probable events and plan for alternative ways to continue in business rather than adopting a simple break/fix attitude. There is almost always an alternative – for example, if the invoicing application breaks down, it could be done by hand in some cases.
The key to BCM is making sure those who operate the business are involved at every stage once business management has given the green light. The key to financing BCM is not to use the big numbers but to understand that business efficiency is the way to go.
See Why business continuity management plans fail – and how to get them right by Stuart Hotchkiss for Computerworld UK.
Tags: BCM, Business Continuity, due diligence
