What To Look For In Business Continuity Compliance & Risk Software
If management (or an auditor) were to ask you the following questions today, could you definitively answer “yes” to all of them?
- Is our business continuity (BC) program compliant with industry standards?
- Is our risk exposure at an acceptable level?
- Have we addressed any gaps in our BC program?
- Are we using our resources (time, money, and people) as effectively as we can?
If you can’t say yes to all of the above, then it’s time to take action. And taking action isn’t as hard as you think.
Business continuity software is an excellent way to evaluate and improve your program, without hiring outside help. The right business continuity planning software can do the hard work of ensuring standards alignment, identifying gaps in your program, calculating levels of risk, and even helping to determine if you’re using your resources effectively—making it easier for you to build a stronger business continuity management (BCM) program.
5 Things To Look For In Business Continuity Software
1. Security
If the BCM software tool you’re using is cloud-based, it should be secure and ensure the confidentiality and integrity of your company information. Your data should also be protected against loss due to server crashes or outages.
About BCMMetrics™: We understand the importance of protecting sensitive company information and take data security seriously. Your data is protected by firewalls and 256-bit SSL encryption; it’s also backed up daily with military-grade encryption to multiple off-site locations. You don’t have to worry about backups, updates, or security—we’ve got you covered.
2. Standards Compliance
A good BC program should align with one or more sets of standards to ensure high recovery potential and prove to stakeholders that you’re managing the program responsibly. So it’s important that your business continuity management software uses standards as the basis for evaluation.
Interested in seeing how the BCMMetrics™ suite works? Schedule a free demo and we’ll give you an inside look.
About BCMMetrics™: Our tools were designed to address overall BCM management using today’s most current industry standards, so it accurately reflects where your program is. If your business receives a high score within our tool, you can be absolutely certain that you have a high-performing program. Also, the software is updated whenever industry standards change. Our tools align with eight standards, including ISO 22301, FFIEC, BCI Good Practices, and NFPA 1600.
3. Reliability
Before you commit, give any BCM software tool a thorough evaluation to ensure it does what it’s supposed to do: measure your level of compliance according to a set (or sets) of standards and evaluate your level of risk. You should be able to give the tool a test run first.
About BCMMetrics™: Our BIA On-Demand (BIAOD) tool uses only the most pertinent and targeted questions to evaluate the criticality of your business units and processes.
Compliance Confidence (C2) maximizes your standards compliance with a broad set of questions modeled after today’s leading practices, standards, and guidelines to ensure optimal evaluation and measurement of your program. It assesses your program across seven dimensions for a thorough evaluation:
- Program Administration
- Crisis Management
- Business Recovery
- Disaster Recovery
- Supply Chain Risk Management
- Third Party Management
- Fire & Life Safety
Residual Risk (R2) weighs the potential impacts of various losses and evaluates your mitigating controls to formulate a complete and accurate assessment of your recovery plans. You can review our residual risk calculation process here.
4. Ease Of Use
The business continuity software you choose should be easy to use without outside help (though there should be access to help if you need it!).
About BCMMetrics™: It’s our belief that simpler is better, so each of our tools is intuitive and easy to use. All can be accessed from a central portal, making it simple to navigate from one tool to the next. Questions are straightforward and easy to answer. If you do need help anywhere along the way, we offer eight hours of consulting with each subscription. All of our tools are highly flexible and can be configured to match the needs of your individual business.
5. Actionable Reports
Evaluations and assessments aren’t useful unless you can act on them. Your business continuity management software should present clear results, provide simple analysis of them, and enable you to share those insights with your team.
About BCMMetrics™: Each of our tools offers a variety of insightful reports that are easily shared with stakeholders, including the following (and more):
- Management Reports
- Summary Reports
- Trending Reports
- Action Items
Here’s what you’ll get with each of our tools:
- Compliance Confidence (C2) gives you a simple “FICO-like” score that will help you determine the most efficient way to allocate resources for the future of your program. You can also compare your own company’s score against the scores of other users, giving you an idea of where your program stands in relation to the rest of your industry.
- Residual Risk (R2) uses a simple scoring method that clearly identifies areas of success and opportunities for improvement.
- BIA On-Demand (BIAOD) produces customized lists, charts, and graphs detailing your recovery time objectives for all evaluated processes and business units.
Give BCMMetrics™ A Try Today
Want to see the BCMMetrics™ suite of business continuity software in action? We’d be happy to walk you through it. Visit our website to schedule a demo at your convenience, and take the first step toward greater confidence in your business continuity program.
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.
