Why Business Continuity Plans and Disaster Recovery Plans are Essential for your Business

While a Business Continuity Plan (BCP) and a Disaster Recovery Plan (DCP) may sound similar and do overlap a bit, there are significant differences between the two documents, especially when it comes to how your business approaches information technology. While a BCP is focused on helping the business sustain its regular organisational objectives both during and after disruptions, a DRP is focused on information systems, and how to restore those systems after a crisis.

So why do you need these documents? Because in the event of a crisis, your workforce needs to be back on track as fast as possible to reduce the loss of revenue and resources.

Disasters can occur with little or no warning and can cripple a business’ ability to function and achieve their strategic goals. Some disasters that your business might face include:

• Cyber Crime
  In 2020, the Australian Cyber Security Centre received one cybercrime report every 10 minutes, with twice as many corporate cybercrime victims as five years ago. Cybercrime is on the rise and most businesses will be affected by it at some point. Ransomware could hold your data hostage, and if you don’t have backups in place, you might be forced to pay a massive ransom to continue your operations. Hackers can also infect your workstations and network devices with a virus that renders them unusable. In either event, a well-considered DRP can mean your business is ready to get back to work within hours, rather than days or weeks.

• Natural Disasters
  If all your critical documents and business resources exist only on hard drives in your main office without any offsite backups, a natural disaster like a bushfire or flood could destroy all your information systems in a flash, leaving you with no way to recover your critical data. Having a BCP before an event like this happens means you can keep your business running and maintain continuity of service to your customers even in the face of unforeseen disasters.

• Major Hardware Failure
  Sometimes, however rarely, your critical hardware may fail, corrupting your data or rendering it unrecoverable. Having cloud-based and offsite storage solutions in place provides important protection from these events. If your business is prepared for emergencies and can restore its data after a crisis, your business won’t have to deal with the massive loss of revenue that typically comes with hardware failure.

• Human Error
  Human error is a major factor in data loss, and BCPs and DRPs are commonly put into action after events accidentally triggered by people inside the business. The prevalence of human error events, like important documents being accidentally deleted or falling victim to a phishing scam, can be greatly reduced with employee awareness training. Even so, having your data backed up will always be the most effective way to protect your business.

As businesses continue to digitise, ensuring BCPs and DCPs are in place should be a key part of their risk mitigation strategy. Modern businesses simply cannot afford the risk of operating without them.
If you would like to learn more about Business Continuity plans and DRP for your business, please contact us.