As Murphy’s first law states, “Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong”, and that’s also a general rule about life that we often tend to forget. This rule applies to the business environment too. Every business, regardless of its size, is at risk of potential disasters. That’s why having a comprehensive BCDR strategy in place is key to keep your business’ operations running. We can’t predict what will happen, but we can prepare for a crisis. It might not happen now or tomorrow, but it might happen sooner or later. 

Failing to prepare for a crisis can have damaging consequences for your business and often lead to business failure. If you think you don’t need a backup plan, think again. These are the potential damages your business could be facing if you’re not prepared:

1. Compliance Violation

Every business is required by law to fulfil certain compliance standards and protect sensitive data of clients, employees, and third parties. If critical business information or sensitive data ever gets compromised or lost, your business could be facing hefty financial fines.

2. Reputation Damage

By having a comprehensive BCDR plan in place, you’re demonstrating to your clients and partners that you take their data and its protection seriously. We all know that disasters can happen, but it’s key to ensure that you have effective measures in place to overcome them. If you fail to have a backup plan, it could not just damage your reputation, it could ruin the future of your business too.

3. Financial Loss

Disasters such as a power outage, weather emergencies, natural disasters, explosions, cyber-attacks, or server downtime, can be very damaging and lead to interruptions of your business operations. If your operations are down, you’ll be unable to function. The costs associated with business interruptions can be as high as 7-figures. The longer the downtime is, the more it costs. And that doesn’t include liability penalties and fines which could cost even more. Having a BCDR plan in place can help reduce costly downtime and consequently save you a lot of money

4. Productivity Loss

If you lose critical data or your operations stop running, your productivity can take a hit as your employees don’t have the required means to do their jobs. Your salespeople might not be able to convert, your financial team might not be able to process payments. Various departments of your organisation could be affected, which could significantly impact your business and therefore your revenue.   

5. Business Failure

Many businesses who aren’t prepared and don’t have a backup plan in place, can be out of business for months and in the worst-case scenario are unable to able to recover from a crisis. Especially small businesses as they usually don’t have the finances to afford extensive downtime. Having a BCDR plan in place can’t prevent a disaster, but it can help you get your business back on track and recover with minimal downtime and data loss.

What does a successful BCDR plan include?  

For a successful and comprehensive BCDR plan, you should make sure to have the following objectives on your checklist: 

• Analyse and assess potential threats and set priorities for the recovery strategy  
• Make a list of critical business processes that are essential to keep your operations running 
• Identify stakeholders without whom the business couldn’t operate and ensure you’ve got the management contact information to hand 
• Know where your backup data is located, and how to access and implement it 
• Ensure that all departments of your business are collaborative 

If your business doesn’t have a comprehensive backup plan yet, we’re happy to sit down and develop a robust strategy to help future-proof your business and make it more resilient. We’ll make sure that your business is fully prepared for potential disasters or challenges. As Murphy’s Law states, “Anything that can go wrong, will ”, so it’s better to be prepared, just in case.

Future-proof your business