An ex-director of British Airways was once quoted as saying "Business survival is everybody’s job, just as customer service is everyone’s job. If you have a business continuity manager you should sack them….."

A teeny bit extreme maybe, particularly given that in most organisations there wouldn’t be any business continuity management without the business continuity manager.

But there’s a serious point here. And the point is that in many organisations, business continuity management isn’t seen as being part of everyone’s normal job. So they seldom think about it, let alone practise it. Because that’s the job of the business continuity manager isn’t it?

Our friend at British Airways went on to say "…if you have a customer service manager you should sack them now!" But most organisations, even though customer service might be ingrained in the culture, still need a customer service manager to drive the process forward, to ensure a consistent approach and to help with awareness and training and all those other good things that actually make it work.

So the business continuity manager is an important person, and perhaps sacking them wouldn’t be a great move. But we do need to ensure that everyone in the business – and that’s everyone in the business, from the CEO down to the office junior – understands that business continuity management is an important part of their normal day job, and that it’s not the role of (and actually, it’s not possible for) the business continuity manager to do it for them.