New business recovery and review service launched by ContinuitySA

ContinuitySA has launched a new service to assist South African corporations in ensuring their business continuity and disaster recovery plans are practical, effective and compliant.

The new Recovery Coordination and Review Service assists clients in coordination and testing of their business continuity management plans with review of the plans and process, according to international best practices to ensure the required outcomes are achieved.

Megan Boonzaier, BCM consultant at ContinuitySA, says environmental uncertainty and new corporate governance laws are driving more companies to look beyond their current business and IT recovery strategies as they realise they need to have complete business recovery plans in place. Stakeholders are today demanding effective business continuity management strategies to ensure their investments will not be put at risk in the event of natural or human disasters.

These companies are not necessarily skilled in business continuity and therefore rely on experts in the field to assist in designing and implementing effective recovery strategies. This is where the new service assists in ensuring the plans developed achieve the desired outcomes and comply with governance requirements.

Boonzaier says there are four steps to an effective business recovery plan:

1. Define the recovery objectives. Ascertain what business services need to be recovered and their importance to the continued functioning of the company; 2. Determine the time in which each service needs to be up and running after an event renders normal business processes inoperable; 3. Develop the plan to implement the requirements of 2; and 4. Test the plans to ensure they will work as required in an emergency.

“Business continuity plans are crucial in today's enterprise, but they cannot be regarded as being acceptable before they are tested. This is the only way that organisations can ensure their efficacy,” states Boonzaier. “ContinuitySA's new service will not only assist in designing effective test scenarios, but will also monitor them and highlight areas of vulnerability where clients need to improve.”

ContinuitySA has proven this process of designing, testing and modifying continuity plans over the past 25 years it has been in operation and its consultants are able to streamline business continuity processes to ensure a successful recovery. The testing phase is also used to ensure the company's continuity plans are compliant with the governance standards applicable to its industry.

“Our goal is also to pass on the required skills and knowledge to empower each company to manage and update its own business continuity management strategies and plans as the company grows and changes over time,” adds Boonzaier.