importance of solid disaster recovery plan
- Cybersecurity

What Are The Important Components of A Solid Disaster Recovery Plan?

Experts explain how a solid disaster recovery plan is important for small businesses

Disasters can occur due to natural causes such as floods, bush fires, and earthquakes, or they can be caused due to reasons instigated by man such as a cyber attack. Whatever the case may be, disasters are damaging for businesses – financially and logistically. All good businesses should have a solid Disaster Recovery Plan (DRP) that will help them recover and get back on their feet in the aftermath of a disaster.

DRP helps minimize the adverse consequences of a disaster. An effective and solid DRP consists of the following components. Let us take a look at them.

Communication Plan and Assignment of Specific Roles

  • Some of the biggest blunders are made due to miscommunication when faced with a disaster. Since disasters strike all of a sudden and out of the blue, it is important to have a clearly outlined communication plan that keeps all employees on the same page. The communication plan should contain the updated contact information of all employees and it should outline the roles assigned to all employees.

For e.g. who is responsible for setting up workstations and who will assess the damage etc., all these roles should be specified in the Disaster Recovery Plan.

Have A Safety Plan For Your IT Equipment

  • Whatever the nature of business is, IT equipment is crucial for running it. It is important to have your IT hardware out of harm’s way whenever a disaster strikes. This requires moving the hardware to a safe, water and fire-proof place where the disaster can’t touch it.

Data Continuity System

This means understanding the physical and digital components that are absolutely crucial to the continuity of your business. You need to make an assessment of the operational, financial, logistic, and communication needs of the organization. After that, you should prepare a backup plan for meeting these needs in case a disaster strikes. Limiting downtime and continuing with business as usual are the two goals of a DRP.

Backup Check

  • Preventing the loss of data in the face of a disaster is critical. Certain backup checks should be performed periodically to ensure that the backup is up and running. Backup data should be stored in a location that will not be impacted by the disaster. Backup should be stored in cloud systems as well on the external hard drive that can be grabbed quickly in case of an emergency.

solid disaster recovery plan

Maintaining a Detailed and Updated Asset Inventory.

For effective disaster management, it is important to maintain a detailed and updated inventory of all assets that are used by the employees. These assets may include an inventory of workstations and their components, printers, phones, servers, tablets, scanners, and other items. Knowing your asset inventory will help you reclaim it through insurance, minimizing the financial loss.

  • Do not forget to include photos of the assets in the inventory for the facilitation of the insurance process.

Vendor Communication and Service Restoration Plan

A typical vendor communication plan includes updated contact information of all vendors and summaries of previous business dealings with them. This will help you get things running in minimum time.

  • A service restoration plan includes arranging for power backup and looking for alternative sources to power your facility in the event of a power outage. Restoration of phone and internet services is also crucial for getting things back on track.

This information has been brought to you by Outsource My IT.