We’ve been through preparing your business for major disasters before on our blog. One of the most important aspects of being ready for the worst is to come up with a plan and strategy for recovery. But, what should you be thinking about when you are making your recovery plan? We’re going to take a close look at some of the most important points to add to your checklist.
Knowledge of potential costs
It’s important to understand exactly how much a full-scale disaster will cost you if the worst occurs. You need to create some hypothetical situations to cover all the bases. Look at worst-case scenarios for every potential disaster, whether it’s a data breach, flood, or power cut. It will help you highlight which areas of your business will be hit the worst, and allow you to plan accordingly.
Knowledge of mission-critical assets
Look at all your business assets and rank them in order of importance. Once you have done this, make sure that you have enough provisions in place to allow you to react in the event of a disaster. The most simple example would be that in the case of a power cut, you could use a generator or backup power unit to continue working.
Speed of response
Your strategy should also include an estimate of how quickly you can respond to each event, for every level of severity. Let’s say that you are planning for a fire. At the most extreme level, it could burn down your entire premises, meaning you will have to up sticks and move elsewhere to continue working. You have to have an idea of how long that transfer will take so that you can plan for it. But, you should also plan for lower level events, too. In this case, it will involve installing fire safety products to prevent and stop fires, and training up a fire official for your business. How quickly will they be able to react? What happens when the fire officer isn’t there? The idea of planning a recovery strategy is to make sure you can carry on with the least amount of disruption.
Understand your obligations
Part of your strategic process should involve looking at all your responsibilities as a business owner, both contractual and legal. If you aren’t aware of them now, how can you guarantee you will act in the right way when the worst happens? In fact, it’s appropriate to plan your entire recovery strategy around your obligations. Those rules and regulations will include the bare minimum that will be expected of you. It could be meeting customer orders, for example, or continuing to order from a supplier. Unfortunately, it won’t always be the case that suffering a disaster will free you from your obligations. Unless, of course, an exemption comes as part of the contract.
Test the plan
Finally, make sure that you are running through your recovery plan and testing it to ensure it works. If you don’t, how can you be sure it will even work? Even the best-laid plans can fall to bits when reality bites.
Hope this has helped – let us know what you think!
