How quickly you bounce back after a disaster may depend on how well you plan before it.
Data is one of, if not the most, important resources for any organization. And, protecting it from disaster, whether intentional or accidental, is no longer optional. As we have mentioned in our previous post, keeping an up to date BCP and DRP is a crucial component of your disaster recovery and business continuity strategy. In this post, we detail the components of a healthy BCP.
1. Recover personnel
Successful BCPs are built from the top down. This means that your first step getting buy-in and support from top management. Once this is in place, assign a dedicated person to manage the process and assemble a team comprising a member of each critical business department in your organization. Within your team, there should also be a chain of command; in other words, “who is doing what, where and when” and “how and where the relevant participants can be reached”.
2. Recovery procedure
The recovery procedure is that part of your BCP that outlines the strategies for business functionality. This strategy should identify and prioritize critical business assets such as equipment, the IT system (including network diagrams), contact lists, etc. In order to ensure your BCP is capable of protecting these assets, identify the potential risks and threats to those assets and compile a system that will assist you in recovering from a critical event or natural disaster.
3. Data backup
Statistics show that approximately 23% of organizations that fall prey to cyber-attacks lose business opportunities as a direct result of data loss. You should therefore have a proper backup strategy as part of your BCP. There are two types of backups that you must consider when designing your backup strategy: on-site backup and off-site backup. On-site can use tape drives, external hard drives and are easier to access than off-site backup. Off-site backup and the need for it have been discussed in part 3 above. You should furthermore include the following company documents in your backup plan: financial documentation (such as bank statements, tax records etc.), a list of fixed assets and legal documents such as copies of agreements, policies, memoranda of understanding, insurance documents, etc.
Disaster recovery and business continuity planning are crucial components of an organization’s risk management strategy. Stage2Data offers decades of experience and technical intelligence that moves our clients seamlessly from tape to disk2disk. Our solutions are scaleable, flexible and deliver impressive ROIs, substantial IT time savings and improved security and peace of mind. Contact our team for more information today.
