Every Kent organisation faces potential disruptions to day-to-day business. These disruptions could be due to IT failures, cyber intrusions, weather, or other factors. The crucial issue is preparation. You cannot know what factors will affect your business, but you can take a careful look at where problems may occur, and what you will do if this happens.
The longer you take to address problems, the harder and longer the recovery process. Creating a disaster recovery plan is something positive all Kent businesses can do to ensure the speed of response and minimisation of long-term disruptions. It may seem highly unlikely that your business in Kent will be faced with a disaster, but a plan is a form of insurance for the scenario that you believe (and hope) will never happen.
Begin the Process By Allocating Budgets and Achieving Sign-Off
A disaster recovery plan needs buy-in from management, and you will also need to set the budget for any systems or procedures you need to set in place. Start your plan by securing the support of the organisation as a whole and make sure that you have the resources in place to allocate to the plan. Start the process by appointing the relevant people to handle drawing up and implementing the plan.
Complete a Risk Assessment
Kent IT Services providers know that every business is different, which is why they will first perform an in-depth risk assessment to identify the particular threats facing a business. They will look at the likelihood of a business being affected by specific issues and the likelihood of damage occurring in the case of these issues. Budgets are not normally large, so it is important to prioritise and decide which problems are more important. Establish priorities and decide which issues are most urgent.
Look at Recovery Strategies
While you do not, at this stage, have to decide on which strategies you are going to use, it is a good idea to understand the types of methods you have for dealing with problems. This will help you decide on the best methods, and also to rule out anything that is beyond your individual budget or the scope of the organisation.
Collate Your Data
Next, collect the essential information you will need in order to put your recovery strategies in place, including contact details, supplier details, staff names and positions, details of power companies, insurance details, data flow information, etc. Make sure you have enough information to understand how you can fit a plan together.
Set Up a Plan
Plan to deal with each threat you have identified in your audit. Look at a general framework that can be adapted for each threat, including deciding how to secure the systems, people, or premises, how to ensure people are safe, what to do as a temporary solution, and how to begin the recovery process. Once a draft plan has been formulated, test it and then re-evaluate the strength of the plan against your results.
