Hurricanes are coming (and winter, too). Will your organization be ready for bad weather?
Pssttt…get your free disaster recovery readiness assessment with a disaster recovery plan template at the end of this article.
I’m sure your inbox has been blown up lately with emails about backups and Hurricane Irma. While your business may have been spared this time, there’s always a chance it might not be the next. The fact is that having a backup and disaster recovery (BDR) plan in place is essential to the success (and survival) of any organization.
Some people think that having a simple backup in place covers all the bases. This is not accurate! If your business is hit, there’s a good chance an onsite backup will not make it – thus, your files are gone. Are you willing to risk it?
Before we go any further, let’s define what backup and disaster recovery means…
What Is Backup and Disaster Recovery?
The first step to protecting your business is knowing the difference between backup and disaster recovery.
- Merriam-Webster defines backup as “a copy of computer data (such as a file or the contents of a hard drive).”
- Disaster recovery is defined as “an area of security planning that aims to protect an organization from the effects of a significant negative event.”
All in all, a backup is really only part of a much more complex disaster recovery plan to protect your organization from data loss and natural disasters.
What Needs to Be in Your Disaster Recovery Plan?
Every disaster recovery plan needs the following to be effective:
- Checklist of items to be completed
- Recovery time objective (RTO) & recovery point objective (RPO)
- Inventory of software and hardware
- Backup worksite plan
- Disaster recovery team with assigned roles
- Detailed diagram of your network
- Written statement for clients and the public
Once you have the plan completed, you must communicate it with your employees and test it out. Update regularly as technology and policies change.
Need help in creating a disaster recovery plan? Or want to review your current plan?
Give us a call today at 704-658-1707 to schedule your free disaster recovery readiness assessment.
