Companies must take disaster planning and business continuity very seriously. These are two very critical concepts, and having a good grasp of these concepts can help you mitigate the effects of a potential disaster, such as a hurricane or fire.

Business continuity and disaster recovery are important business planning tasks. And if you do them right, they offer some of the highest paybacks and can potentially save a business from going under.

Unfortunately, many business professionals and IT managers consider this area of planning as a never-ending exercise that consumes resources and time. They think that a disaster may never even happen and thus, deem that it is unnecessary.

When you ask most companies about their disaster preparedness, many will often point to data backups as their sole protection process. Unfortunately, this is not enough, and you have to do more. Backing up all the data and securing it at a stored location does not ensure that the data is safe from natural risks.

While people can agree that disaster planning and business continuity are primarily the responsibility of the IT department, disaster planning is also a business problem that affects all workers in the company, from the CEO to the frontline workers.

Every piece of information that flows throughout the company passes through the IT department. IT individuals in a business have unique insights regarding the daily operations of a business and make constant communications between the workers of each department. This makes them the most suitable department for the task of disaster recovery.

What is a Disaster Recovery Plan?

The disaster recovery plan translates to how a business will prepare for a disaster. Preparing for a disaster involves formulating an effective organizational response in the event of a disaster. This includes all the steps the company will take to ensure that all business operations can continue without any disturbance.

This plan can include many possible situations as there can be many reasons for a disaster. The causes of disaster include persistent criminal attacks, natural disasters, outages, and many more. This is why everyone in your organization must be familiar with the disaster recovery plan so that everyone is aware of their roles in the face of disaster.

 What is a Business Continuity Plan?

The business continuity plan is a new methodology of dealing with service interruption. It lays down the steps a company must take to mitigate the effects of all network and business disruptions.

As technologies become faster and cheaper, companies are now computerizing most of their operational procedures. The integration of computerized systems helps further minimize the impact of unplanned downtime in an organization. The prevalence of malware, viruses, and software threats of today make continuity planning a standard procedure in IT management, and it should not be ignored.

One typical example of business continuity can be generators in medical facilities that ensure that operations do not come to a halt, even in instances of a power outage.

Ideally, the best IT practice for business continuity would be replicating all company servers at an off-site location. This is, however, unnecessary and costly. Another alternative would be to use cloud solutions and assign resources to the critical cloud server.

Differences between Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity

Business continuity ensures that all of the most essential or crucial business functions will remain available after an incident by the time the disaster recovery process is complete. This decreases the short-term negative impacts of the event on the company, its customers, and its employees.

Seek Third-Party Integrations

Handling business continuity planning and disaster recovery strategies can be time-consuming and challenging for a small business, as it takes time and requires effort.

Your best bet against this would be hiring an IT outsourcing company that uses cloud-based, cost-effective methods for disaster management and continuity strategies. One such example is Prescient. You can contact them now and make the most of a wide range of services that can help mid-sized and small businesses grow and stay secure.