Business Continuity: Plan Now or Pay Later

By Greg Coleman

Corporations are vulnerable to all manner of conditions that can interrupt business operations, ranging from major events such as earthquakes and hurricanes to less publicized but potentially damaging events such as IT system failures, communications interruptions, and cybersecurity breaches. Such events can inflict protracted damage if business services are interrupted for any length of time.

Over the past several years, business continuity planning has been brought into focus as companies were forced to deal with disaster-related business interruptions. Companies that are unprepared for such disasters can face serious consequences, including loss of revenue and customers due to a lack of proper business continuity planning.

While typical business continuity and disaster recovery plans focus on core areas such as backing up data, evacuating facilities, and communicating office closures to employees, many ignore the most public-facing aspect of the business: customer service and support.

Poor planning is particularly troublesome for service operations since these organizations are the primary point of contact for most companies. Dropping the ball on the service front during a crisis removes the ability to communicate with customers, a critical asset in the event of significant business disruption. Falling silent during a disaster, or allowing customer service to respond in an uncoordinated fashion, could have a significant impact on company image, customer satisfaction, and the bottom line.

Companies continue to face a myriad of potential threats, including extreme weather, pandemic outbreaks, cybersecurity breaches, and many others. Organizations that have not fully incorporated service operations into their plans are exposing themselves to potentially severe consequences.

Fortunately, it is not too late to add this critical component to corporate business continuity plans. The primary objective should be to minimize the impact an outage or disruption has on service operations and to implement effective communication strategies to keep customers informed during interruptions.

Creating a Bulletproof Plan

While developing an effective plan will require significant effort, the results will be well worth it. Planning efforts act as an insurance policy and provide peace of mind to corporate management, secure in the knowledge that consideration is being given to safeguarding against future disruptions. An effective plan will help prioritize the steps necessary to enable recovery from a wide array of potential scenarios. It should prepare the service organization to continue assisting customers during the initial phases of an incident and include short-, medium-, and long-term contingencies, since an event can last one day or potentially several months.

Another important element to business continuity planning is getting the word out. A successful plan will identify employees responsible not only for carrying out the functions necessary to ensure a smooth transition to contingent services, but also for maintaining contact lists and providing communications that keep all parties informed of status, timelines, processes, implementation, and resolution issues. Keeping customers apprised of recovery efforts is also an important part of the communications process. By proactively keeping them informed, you can minimize inquiries about service outages that may distract from recovery efforts and help ease customer concerns.

Training employees on the plan is equally important. Educating the broader staff on key aspects of the plan will ensure they are prepared when the time comes to implement it. Providing key employees with handbooks, either in hard copy or as a PDF on local devices, detailing contingency procedures will ensure they are available even if IT or communications systems go down. Relying on the internet as the sole delivery method for business continuity plans is not recommended. Whenever possible, use redundant methods of communication and provide access to contingency procedures for all employees.

The service portion of the business continuity plan should cover as many operational areas as possible to ensure the organization can recover quickly. Contingencies should include customer data recovery, rerouting telecommunications, and falling back to manual systems for logging customer interactions. Additional consideration should be given to utilizing secondary service centers, offsite facilities, or third-party providers to handle customer interactions while primary service functions in affected areas recover.

To remain relevant, business continuity plans need to be reviewed and updated periodically so they reflect the current operational recovery plan. Typically, plans are updated at least annually and more frequently depending on the pace of change within the business environment. The service organization should also test the plans on a schedule to ensure they can be implemented effectively. Copies of the plan should be kept outside the corporate environment in the event facilities are not accessible. The benefits of having a solid plan in place cannot be understated.

Disaster Recovery Best Practices

So what can service organizations do to ensure their business continuity plans are up to par? These best practices are aligned with industry standards for service and support operations:

• Ensure that the business continuity plan is fully documented in every respect. Confirm appropriate service and support personnel have been trained to execute it in an emergency, and train them immediately if needed.
• Include detailed task lists, contact numbers, decision criteria, roles and responsibilities, timelines, and short-, medium-, and long-term contingencies for each potential scenario defined in the plan.
• Include a documented test plan that defines specific test scenarios. Execute it on a defined schedule, such as quarterly or semi-annually, to ensure the contingency plan can be effectively implemented when necessary.
• Conduct a periodic risk analysis to assess system vulnerabilities, prioritize potential threats, and define contingencies to address issues identified through the analysis.
• Ensure clearly defined service level agreements with the internal IT organization and system vendors are in place. They should specify uptime and return-to-service commitments for critical systems so recovery time can be estimated and customer expectations set properly.
• In mission-critical service environments, plan to reroute customer inquiries to alternate service centers or leverage third-party service providers. As an alternative, contract for use of hot sites that enable temporary relocation of service operations. Test any of these options routinely.
• Develop notification messages for employees and customers to inform them of potential outages or disaster situations. Scripted voice messages, pre-drafted emails, social posts, website postings, and press release templates can be prepared in advance for customization and deployment when necessary.
• After the plan has been tested or implemented during real-world situations, conduct postmortem reviews to identify opportunities for further improvement and eliminate gaps in the plan.

Aligning business continuity plans with industry standards and best practices will help ensure you are fully prepared in the event of an emergency. Once you have built a solid plan, consider an external audit of preparedness to gain further insight into readiness for handling a catastrophic event.

After all the planning, preparation, and testing, true success is evident only when the plan delivers on its promise during a real-world situation. The ability to continue operating during a crisis is a testament to the commitment to provide world-class service to customers. While no company looks forward to having to use its plan, once it becomes necessary, it quickly becomes evident just how mission-critical it is to the success of the company.

Do not wait for the next hurricane, power outage, or catastrophic event to test readiness. Dust off the business continuity plan today and ensure the organization is prepared to face the challenges ahead. It is not a matter of if a situation will arise, but when. Careful preparation can pay off through uninterrupted business operations, lower financial impact, and stronger customer trust and loyalty.