Business Continuity

Creating a business continuity plan

Downtime can be costly, and data loss poses a significant threat to your business. Major natural disasters aren’t the only concern—issues like a faulty hard drive, lightning strikes, or employee errors can have lasting consequences if your organization isn’t prepared. Let us assist you in developing a business continuity plan by considering the following:

1. Alternate Operations Location: Explore options for switching operations to a different site if needed.
2. Vital Business Operations: Determine how to sustain critical business functions during disruptions.
3. Critical IT Infrastructure: Identify the most crucial components of your IT setup.
4. Backups and Redundancy: Ensure you have tested backups and functional redundant equipment.
5. Documentation: Document your business continuity and disaster recovery processes.
6. Testing Frequency: Regularly test scenarios to verify business continuity.

At Skratsch Solutions, we’re committed to preventing technology problems and helping you recover swiftly in case of a disaster.

Creating a disaster recovery plan

The other critical plan is a disaster recovery plan. While you may not be in an area prone to frequent natural disasters, you remain vulnerable to hardware failures, employee errors, malware, theft, fire, and other data loss risks.

In the event of an unforeseen disaster where you lose your data (or access to it), consider the following:

• Recovery Time Objective (RTO): How quickly do you need to be back up and running?
• Recovery Point Objective (RPO): How much data can you afford to lose?

For more best practice recommendations on backup and recovery, please read the rest of our backup and recovery guidelines.

Building your emergency binder

Whether or not you’ve experienced a disaster, having what we call a ‘red binder’ is crucial. Now, this binder isn’t always red, and it might not even be a physical binder. However, it plays a vital role in data security. Inside this binder, you should maintain up-to-date information about:

• All software programs and their associated passwords
• Configuration settings
• Support phone numbers

Consider this: What if your IT specialist suddenly quits? How do you ensure a smooth transition? The red binder ensures that as a business owner, you can access your computer systems—even if you never thought you’d need to.

Remember to consider the disaster recovery plans of your vendors

Even if it’s not your own disaster, having a recovery plan in place is essential. Have you assessed the backup infrastructure for your cloud-based software programs? There are instances where smaller cloud-based CRM companies have faced business closure due to events like Hurricane Katrina, resulting in data loss for all users. Additionally, there are horror stories about programmers losing custom source code. Fortunately, with affordable online data storage options, such incidents occur less frequently.

Data recovery is all about risk reduction

While there is a tangible cost associated with implementing data recovery plans and business continuity strategies—much like insurance—the importance of keeping your business operational cannot be overstated. If your business remains afloat, you have the opportunity to rebuild. However, if your business fails (as 66% do after a major data loss), the road to recovery often involves significant debt.

Similar to insurance, having a business continuity plan in place before experiencing data loss is crucial. We understand that businesses operate within real budget constraints. Our team ensures that you comprehend your options and risks, empowering you to make informed decisions that align with your business’s needs.