Back in the dim and distant past, when business continuity was in its infancy, its more popular older brother, disaster recovery, was all about IT backup and restoration. Gradually, over time, the focus changed and, while it was accepted that IT was still a key component of a comprehensive business continuity strategy, it became less and less the dominant one. For many organisations – at least those without manufacturing environments – business continuity became largely focussed on recovering office facilities, albeit with IT recovery playing an important role.

But, for most organisations, the huge increase in dependence on IT systems in recent years, coupled with the more recent COVID-fuelled move to mass home working, means things have almost gone full circle, and the emphasis on IT has once again come well and truly to the fore. Many business continuity plans have become much more IT-oriented, although now as much about the ability to access critical applications and data from various locations as the ability to recover them.

Most IT environments look very different today than they did even just a few years ago, as do the associated backup and recovery strategies and solutions. It’s therefore important that business continuity practitioners ensure their IT and, in particular, their IT continuity, knowledge is up to date and up to scratch. Not necessarily to any great technical level, but enough to understand the available strategies and, as importantly, the associated risks and assumptions, which have also changed as our IT environments have changed.

So if you haven’t done so already, now’s the time to build and strengthen connections between IT and the business – to ensure our IT continuity capabilities and the related assumptions and risks are understood by all parties.

 

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