What would happen if your business premises caught fire, was burgled or flooded? Would you be able to keep your business running? Would you be able produce invoices, pay your suppliers and employees? Do you know what software you use and where your data is? Once a disaster hits your business, it is too late to start thinking about answers to these questions. Every business should have a Disaster Recovery Plan prepared in advance.
Disaster Recovery Plan for Small Business
Most large companies have a IT Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity plan which they revise regularly and test. For a small business, having a dedicated person or team maybe beyond your budget, but it is equally important that you have a contingency plan in place if the unexpected happens. Your Insurance will pay out for some capital items, but this will take time, how will you keep your customers, suppliers and employees in the meantime?
Even in the event of a small disaster such as a web server crashing, an key employee becoming sick or the loss of your invoicing system, a Disaster Recovery Plan will help in the quick recovery and continuation of your business without too much disruption.
The goals of your Disaster Recovery plan should be to;
- Establish a plan for business continuity in advance
- Identify the risks and limit the extent of disruption and damage to the business
- Minimize interruption to the normal business operations and minimize the economic impact
- Train key personnel with the emergency procedures
The most common disruption to business is data loss, which can result from computer system hardware failures, theft, human error, natural disasters, theft, malicious corruption, virus attacks, etc. The first step is to identify what data is important to your business, where it is stored, how it is accessed and how it is backed up. Your data maybe stored on a computer, an on-site server or on a Internet Server. In the case of an Internet Service, ensure you include in your plan, what would happen if a 3rd party had a disaster or if your Internet connection was lost. How would you continue to run your business?
Ensure that backups of all your key data is carried out regularly, stored off-site an available for recovery. Decide who will be responsible for managing the backups or if you choose to out-source this, then ensure that you are receiving reports. Test regularly that your data can be recovered and that your plan is reviewed to ensure that new data is being managed.
Please download our Free Disaster Recovery Plan Check-list to help you plan ahead to keep your business running in the event of a disaster.
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