Include Data Backups in Your Business Continuity Plan

At TechBldrs, our team of IT experts can help you create a plan that will have your company up and running during a disaster. The goal is to minimize downtime and restore normal business operations, allowing you to conduct business as usual. 

A business continuity plan identifies critical business applications, systems, and processes, and often contains a checklist that includes data backup procedures, backup site locations, and essential equipment and supplies. 

A BCP will also include contact information for backup site providers, key personnel, and emergency responders, and detailed strategies on how you can maintain business operations for both short and long-term outages. 

When creating a BCP, the team at TechBldrs will:

• Perform a business impact analysis, which allows us to identify any and all critical and time-sensitive business processes and functions and the resources that support them. 
• Outline your plan and include instructions team members must follow during a disaster that will allow you to recover critical business data, processes, and functions 

Disaster Recovery Solutions 

A disaster recovery plan is a key component of your BCP. The plan will contain strategies on how to handle any disruption to mobile devices and personal computers, servers, and networks. The disaster recovery plan will also cover how you and your staff can reestablish software and production so that your business needs will be met. A manual workaround may also be outlined in the plan so that business operations can continue until your systems can be restored. 

High Availability 

This aspect of the plan focuses on processes and capabilities during a local failure so that your company will have access to applications. These failures may be in the software or IT hardware, physical facilities, or business processes. 

Continuous Operation 

This portion of the plan ensures you can keep your business running during planned and unplanned disruptions. 

Why is a Business Continuity Plan Important? 

Many small businesses underestimate the importance of having a business continuity plan. But any type of unplanned interruption of normal business processes can result in costly setbacks and immense hurdles. A company’s operations will suffer and its revenue will suffer even more. 

What Are Unplanned Interruptions?

An unplanned interruption can take many forms. When we think of a disaster, we usually think of a major event, such as a storm, hurricane, or tornado. However, natural disasters are not the only cause of unplanned interruptions. Human error can also result in disaster. A simple accident, users with poor security habits, and untrained employees are also among the most common causes of IT downtime. 

How a Business Continuity Plan Can Help

With a business continuity plan in place, you can reduce the damage and impact of an unplanned interruption. 

While it can take time to design and test a business continuity plan, it's worth the time and money to protect your business. 

Disasters happen all the time. The unexpected nature of a disaster is what makes it so devastating to your business. Being prepared for a disaster won’t prevent one, but it can minimize the impact it will have on your business. Research has shown that over 50% of smaller businesses do not recover from a disaster. Even a large corporation can take a serious hit. 

Data Backup Isn’t Enough 

Many businesses utilize some type of data backup. Backing up data doesn’t do a business any good if the employees are unable to access it, which can occur if employees need to leave an office site, even temporarily, or in the event of a power outage.

So, how can you access your business data during a power outage or other type of disaster?

By implementing disaster recovery and business continuity solutions and leveraging virtual servers, such as cloud services, a company is able to run essential business applications. This allows you to essentially flip a switch and minimize your downtime. 

Insurance Doesn't  Protect Company Data

Every year, cyberattacks become more successful and sophisticated. Unfortunately, it can take several weeks or months to discover a serious breach. An insurance company will not restore data due to backup, server, or data center loss. While insurance can cover the cost of repairs, it will not cover the loss of business prospects and revenue. Because of this, you need to protect your company from serious data loss during a disaster. 

You’ll Have an Edge Over the Competition 

With a BCP in place, you’ll have a major advantage over your competition. With an effective plan, you can restore your essential business operations while your competitors are still trying to find a solution. Reconnecting your employees to support your clients and communicate with each other, restoring access to business documents and data, and getting your network up and running right away makes your business more reliable. 

Keep Your Business Going 

Keeping your company running smoothly is crucial. A business continuity plan makes this possible by implementing the actions you must take to ensure business operations are up and running, regardless of the nature of the disaster. 

TechBldrs Has All the Answers

If there’s a power outage and you have no idea when the power will be restored, are you able to switch to a network or server located in a functional data center? If there’s a server failure do you have a virtual or backup server that’s ready to go? 

If your business location is not accessible due to a natural disaster, are your employees able to work remotely?

When you work with the team at TechBldrs, we can help you design a business continuity plan that covers all the possible disruptions you may encounter and includes the steps that must be taken to get your business up and running for as long as you need. 

A small business cannot afford downtime. A BCP plan can mean the difference between getting your business up and running within minutes versus several days or weeks. 

At TechBldrs, we can create a business continuity plan that allows your business to survive serious disruptions. The plan will also include a clear blueprint for what each employee should do during a disaster to get your company operating as usual. 

Most importantly, this plan supports:

• The flow of documents and information 
• Business security to keep your business information and data secured wherever you’re working 
• Customer service response
• Business operations that are essential to your business activity 
• Communication between you and your employees and customers and employees 
• When you keep your business operations going, you can keep your staff working. 

TechBldrs is Here to Help 

The IT experts at TechBldrs have helped many companies develop and implement business continuity plans and our managed IT services can get rid of the burden of managing and monitoring your company’s data infrastructure to reduce risk and increase your company’s reliability. 

We know that every business is unique, with its own specific needs. When you hire TechBldrs, you can be confident that we’ll work with you to create a business continuity plan that is specifically tailored to your company’s needs.

Contact TechBldrs Today to Schedule a Consultation 

To thrive and withstand a variety of threats, a business must realize it needs to do more to protect data and support growth. At TechBldrs, we can develop a business continuity plan that will retain customers, safeguard your brand, protect data, and keep your business up and running. 

Having a plan in place achieves sustainable improvements in regulatory compliance, crisis management, IT disaster recovery, and business continuity. If your company does not have a business continuity plan, it’s time to take action. Contact the IT experts at TechBldrs today to schedule a consultation and let us help your business continue to grow and thrive.