Here we explain the importance of having a Disaster Recovery Plan and how to craft one
I’m not sure how many of you were scouts in your younger years –but for those who donned the various shades of khaki, two words may have stuck with you through life, ‘Be Prepared’.
A short and sweet motto that’ll put you in good stead for a multitude of situations and certainly notwithstanding the smooth running of your IT and tech systems for your business
WHAT IS A DISASTER RECOVERY PLAN, AND DO I NEED ONE?
The short answer is yes; if yours is a data driven business -the old adage of hope for the best, but plan for the worst stands true.
A Disaster Recovery Plan (DRP) should be crafted for those business for whom a disruption to normal business running cannot be accepted, even briefly. So, the majority.
WHAT IS A DRP?
A Disaster Recovery Plan is a strategy and guidance document that outlines a step-by-step solution should the worst happen to your businesses’ IT infrastructure, data and networks to allow you to revert to business as usual as fast as possible.
The need for a DRP can arise from any manner of incidents; however natural disasters, power outages and cyber-attacks tend to be the primary threats that you will need to provide protection from.
Ideally, your DRP should be created in unison with a Business Continuity Plan, as both are critical to safeguarding the continued steerage of a company.
The importance of a DRP goes well beyond data and networks salvaging for your companies BAU purposes; ask yourself this question -what would be the repercussions to customers and clients’ perceptions should sensitive data be contravened?
Very few small to mid-weight businesses would survive the PR fall-out of a data breach. Now, that would certainly lose you more than a Scouts badge.
If a company is purposely prepared for managing failures or downtime it results in improved customer retention.
Most plans are made with the assumption that infrastructure or networks are not accessible at one site, and therefore most DRP plans enact a recovery and salvage solution at another site.
HOW BEST TO DEVELOP YOUR PLAN?
So, now the merits of a DRP have been explained, how best to go about actioning a plan and what touchpoints need to be factored in for a best-practice strategy?
We recommend the following elements be included in a well-rounded Disaster Recovery Plan:
- Human resources: who is responsible for what and whom have actions and accountabilities
- Goals and best outcomes: All pertinent staff to be trained to play their part for a smooth and rapid restoration of the standard business running
- Inventory of IT items and infrastructure: A DRP must include a breakdown of all IT items and should include the manufacturer, model, serial number, cost etc
- Back-up housing information: a record should be kept of every back up, where it is saved, and what is the amount of data. This should give an immediate overview of how the DRP will be designed so minimal data losses will occur in case of a disaster.
Restoration procedure: outline the measures to restore the entire your business’ system to the standard state. Any loss will need to be assessed and a potential rebuilding of data requirements.
‘BE PREPARED’
A plan is only as good as the execution, and we recommend the assurance of a cloud-based Disaster Recovery (DRaaS) solution such as Veeam to solidify any Disaster Recovery Plan.
Using our reliable and robust data security solutions -you’re guaranteed your data will be safely recovered should the worst happen, and you’ll be operational again within minutes.
For further information on our offerings, click here
