As we look back at 2009, it was a trying year for all of us. We have definitely seen the impact to BCP programs across our client base in the United States. The economy has impacted the readiness of BCP programs across the country, degrading their ability to respond effectively and in a timely manner. Some by-products of the economic situation that are affecting BCP programs are as follows:
- Loss of Key Staff – Not Just in BCP but Across the Organization
- Loss or Elimination of the BCP Budget
- Reduced or Eliminated Recovery Exercises
- Morale Down Across the Organization
- Recovery Initiatives Cut or Reduced
- Organization Focused on Making Money and not BCP
So, with this in mind, we will have to make do with what we have in place and determine how we can best mitigate our organizational exposures and provide a timely response and recovery capability. Using the 80/20 rule as a guideline, focus on the 20% of your recovery program that makes up 80% of what is critical to the organization:
- Make sure company Fire and Life Safety plans are up to date and you can safely evacuate people from the building and account for them.
- Keep company employee status lines and websites up to date and operational.
- Focus solely on the most critical plans (e.g., required in first 3 to 5 days) in your organization and keep them up to date.
- Exercise the most critical plans and teams using short exercises to keep team members abreast of recovery plans and strategies without taking too much of their time.
- Test the Crisis Management Team using 30-Minute Mock Disaster Exercises.
- Reduce alternate site configurations to what is needed in the first week of a disaster; if you have what you need in the first week you can typically survive for at least 30 days.
Be prepared for 2010 to be a year of maintaining your recovery posture and not losing it!
About MHA: MHA Consulting, with its decade-long track record, is a proven leader in business continuity planning, disaster recovery planning, IT best practices and data center moves and relocations. Every day, MHA helps protect trillions of dollars of global-market assets and top companies around the world rely on MHA services for the continuity of their business. For more information on MHA, contact Michael Herrera at herrera at mha-it dot com.
Michael Herrera
Michael Herrera is the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of MHA. In his role, Michael provides global leadership to the entire set of industry practices and horizontal capabilities within MHA. Under his leadership, MHA has become a leading provider of Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery services to organizations on a global level. He is also the founder of BCMMETRICS, a leading cloud based tool designed to assess business continuity compliance and residual risk. Michael is a well-known and sought after speaker on Business Continuity issues at local and national contingency planner chapter meetings and conferences. Prior to founding MHA, he was a Regional VP for Bank of America, where he was responsible for Business Continuity across the southwest region.
