About Business Continuity
Management Continuity
Business starts with people. We help you develop a plan to account for the loss of key employees. And, should something happens to us, you can rest knowing that you have all the information needed to continue managing the network services with another provider.
Business Continuity Plan
We work with you to make sure you have a plan in place before you have a problem. Keep your business operating smoothly, your data safe, and your people productive. It all starts with a good business continuity plan. Let’s look at these 5 strategic parts:
- Understanding the Risk
- Planning
- Prevention
- Monitoring
- Mitigation and Recovery
1. Understanding the Risk
Be prepared to handle different kinds of threats. Does your business have a contingency plan for natural disasters—fires, hurricanes, floods, and tornadoes? And do you realize the biggest common risk to a company’s IT infrastructure is its own people?
Unfortunately, today’s Internet-dependent environment allows good-intentioned employees the daily opportunity to make poor or careless choices with company equipment and data. And of course malicious employees or ex-employees can wreak havoc on a business. Targeted outside attacks on small and midsize businesses are also growing in sophistication. With all these possible disasters, every business needs to update and consistently reassess its business continuity plan. In the case of disaster, don’t lose more business than you have to.
Questions to Consider
- Will your backup plan protect in case of fire, flood, data breach, infection, employee error, and sabotage?
- How long will it take to reconstitute your network under each type of disaster?
- How much downtime can your business survive?
- What is your true cost if the network is down for an hour? A day? A month? Consider loss of revenue, productivity, credibility, opportunity, etc.
- Will your backup data be encrypted?
- Is your backup location dependent?
- Does your solution depend on a functioning Internet connection?
2. Planning
Benefit from our team’s expertise to create the best backup plan for your business.
The Ideal Business Continuity Plan
- Customized
Tailor a backup strategy with your business uniqueness in mind. - Cost Effective
Consider the cost of system maintenance and the efficiency of the recovery process. - Flexible
Design a plan that grows and shrinks with your business.
Maximum Security for Minimum Cost
Make the most of your IT budget. Your business will thrive when you properly balance the costs with your risk tolerance. Our cost-risk analysis will help you find this balance and give you peace of mind as your business grows.
Elements of the Plan
A strategic plan includes:
- Prevention tools—routers, firewalls, security software, data encryption
- Internal policy creation and implementation
- Equipment updating
- Employee education
- Redundant equipment
- Offsite back-up & recovery
- Central monitoring
Questions to Consider
- What redundancies can you afford?
- How will you know if your backup has failed?
- How often should you test your backup solution?
- Is your solution image-based?
3. Prevention
Preventing Network Problems
Merely purchasing a firewall and anti-virus software is insufficient. Network security requires multiple layers of protection, including:
- Proactively avoiding problems on a daily basis
- Identifying and investing in the right support, services, and redundant equipment
- Patching software
- Updating firmware
- Monitoring security tools
- Adhering to policies for encryption, passwords, data access, and Internet use
Enterprise-Level Solutions Without the Heavy Price Tag
We have invested heavily in high-end software systems, effective processes, and employee education. Working with us means you can leverage this investment to benefit your small or medium-sized business.
4. Monitoring
The network is complex, but someone needs to monitor it. We make this easy for you with our regular assessment service. This comprehensive process involves collecting data in an encrypted file, and then analyzing the data to compare it with industry norms and best practices. We share the scans and reports with you, and then save and archive them for future reference and comparison.
For more information, see Network Assessment.
5. Mitigation and Recovery
What backup and recovery plan is best for your company? Here are sample options in case of disaster:
- Alternate location: Employees work from an alternate location on redundant equipment. Productivity loss is negligible.
- Work from home: Employees work from home with little or no notice with access to emails and critical files from remote locations.
- 2-hour or 3-day recovery plan: Invest in a plan compatible with your cost-risk analysis.
Mitigation in the case of a data breach is sometimes beyond our internal expertise. But we function as an adviser and can provide evidence to support due diligence was taken when making decisions and statements to minimize customer and investor confidence loss.
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