Author: Chris Needham-Bennett, Needhams 1834
There is a very cogent argument that risk and security are first cousins although the different types of security response vary as widely as the threat. One risk or threat, sometimes off the security manager’s radar, is that of business continuity, or crisis management or business resilience, or disaster recovery; but to prevent silly sematic squabbles let us stick with ‘business continuity’, the continuation of business activities in the face of some form of adverse events.
Often clients ask for ‘top tips’, there is always a danger in this, but sometimes, if only for brevities sake, it is worth it.
Five tips for reducing business risk:
- Identify the positive opportunities risk presents; an identified risk is an opportunity for some improvement.
- Do not go into too much analysis of risks; the actual event is seldom predictable to any great degree.
- Risk is pretty subjective; if you are not an actuary do not try to use probability, just use instinct.
- Ask other people their opinion; they may well have a different perspective.
- Once you have done what you can about a risk, review it now and again but do not get paranoid!
Five tips for developing business continuity plan:
- Get top level endorsement for the project, otherwise it will fail.
- Allocate time to talk to staff on their plans, otherwise it will be imposed.
- Do not make it too long, otherwise it will remain unread.
- Practice the plan to enhance confidence; otherwise it might as well not exist.
- Plan for the project to take twice as long as you thought it would even if you have already applied this rule!
Evidence suggests that those companies who have a plan and have rehearsed it are better at handling unexpected incidents because they are better at working as a team, and by its nature (at least usually) having to implement a business continuity plan is unexpected.
One last thought if you have to choose between a good plan or a good team always go for the good team; because a bad team cannot use a good plan and a good team will make a bad plan better. Therefore, devote as much time to rehearsals as you do to plan authorship.
Chris Needham-Bennett founded Needhams 1834 Ltd in 1996 and today is regarded as one of the leading Business Continuity consultants in the market. Over the past 12 years he has advised, trained and exercised numerous executive teams from leading public companies and various government departments.
For more information visit: www.needhams1834.com
