The BCP lists the business’s critical functions, systems, processes, and maintenance procedures. Consider business disruptions.
BCPs cover cyberattacks, pandemics, natural disasters, and human error. An organization needs a business continuity plan to protect its health and reputation from the many risks. A good BCP reduces power and IT outages.
IT administrators plan. Executives provide oversight and company knowledge. They update the BCP regularly.
What exactly is a Business Continuity Plan (BCP)?
A business continuity plan (BCP) protects and recovers from threats. The plan protects and quickly restores personnel and assets in a disaster.
Key takeaways
Business continuity plans (BCPs) protect against natural disasters and cyberattacks.
BCP protects personnel and assets and ensures quick recovery after disasters.
Test BCPs to find and fix flaws.
Understanding Business Continuity Plans (BCPs) BCPs define all risks to the company’s operations, making them an important part of risk management. Fires, floods, and cyberattacks are risks. The plan should include:
Assessing how risks will impact operations
Risk-reducing measures
Validation procedures
updating the process
Businesses need BCPs. Threats and disruptions reduce revenue and increase costs, lowering profitability. Insurance doesn’t cover all costs or customers who defect to the competition, so businesses can’t rely on it alone. Key stakeholders and personnel help plan it.
Business Continuity Plans require business impact analysis, recovery, organization, and training.
BCP advantages
Businesses face many disasters, from minor to catastrophic. Business continuity planning helps companies survive major disasters like fires. BCPs don’t recover a company’s IT system like a disaster recovery plan does.
Consider a big-city finance company. It may create a BCP by backing up computer and client files offsite. Satellite offices would have access to vital information if the corporate office were destroyed.
In the event of a pandemic, BCP may not be as effective. BCPs can mitigate risk and prevent disruptions. They can also reduce network downtime, saving the company money.
Making a BCP
A solid BCP requires several steps for many companies. These are:
Business Impact Analysis: The business identifies time-sensitive functions and resources. See below.
Recovery: The company must identify and implement steps to recover critical business functions.
Establish a continuity team. This team will plan for disruption.
Training: The continuity team must be tested. The team should also practice the plan and strategies.
A checklist with emergency contact information, a list of resources the continuity team may need, where backup data and other needed information are stored, and other important persons may be useful for companies.
The company should test the BCP and continuity team. To ensure it works in many risk scenarios, test it several times. This will help find and fix plan flaws.
BCI Analysis
A BCP needs a business continuity impact analysis. It analyzes business process disruptions. It decides recovery priorities and strategies using the data.
FEMA provides a business continuity analysis operational and financial impact worksheet. Business function and process managers who know the company should complete the worksheet. Worksheets will summarize the following:
Losing business functions and processes has financial and operational repercussions.
Determining when losing a function or process would cause business impacts.
The analysis can help companies identify and prioritize processes that affect financial and operational functions. They must be recovered by the “recovery time objective.”
BCP vs. DRP
BCPs and disaster recovery plans are similar, but the latter emphasizes IT infrastructure. BCPs cover everything, including customer service and supply chain.
BCPs reduce costs and losses, while disaster recovery plans only address technology downtimes and costs. Only IT staff create and manage disaster recovery plans. BCPs have more staff trained on potential processes.
Common Questions
Why is BCP Important?
Business continuity plans (BCPs) are crucial because businesses are vulnerable to many minor and catastrophic disasters. BCP helps companies survive threats and disruptions. This could lower revenue and increase costs, lowering profitability. Insurance doesn’t cover all costs or customers who defect to the competition, so businesses can’t rely on it alone.
What Should a BCP Include?
Business continuity plans identify all operational risks. The plan should also assess how those risks will impact operations and implement safeguards. Testing should verify these safeguards and procedures. Finally, the plan should be updated through a review process.
Business Continuity Impact Analysis?
Business continuity impact analysis is crucial to BCP development. It decides recovery priorities and strategies using the data.
FEMA provides a business continuity analysis operational and financial impact worksheet.
These worksheets show how losing business functions and processes affects finances and operations. They also determine when losing a function or process would cause business impacts.
Conclusion
Business continuity plans (BCPs) help organizations recover faster from threats and disasters. The plan minimizes downtime for employees and assets. BCPs cover all organizational risks in a flood or fire.
