Disaster Recovery Journal

By Christopher Burton, Senior Consultant, Avalution Consulting
Article originally posted on Avalution Consulting’s Blog

Since 2005, Avalution Consulting has performed hundreds of business continuity exercises with organizations in every major industry and sector throughout the United States.  No matter the scope of the exercise or the level of complexity, several key elements enable the successful outcome of this important component of the business continuity lifecycle.  This perspective shares some of our lessons learned, highlights the importance of exercising and provides insight into our time-tested exercise methodology. 

By Susan Giffin, Managing Consultant, Avalution Consulting
Article originally posted on Avalution Consulting’s Blog

We recently published a perspective (Business Continuity for Small Businesses – We Can Do Better!) on how most small and medium-sized organizations escape the complexity of larger organizations and thus have the opportunity to implement streamlined business continuity planning processes, which should include:

By Robert Giffin, Director, Avalution Consulting
Article originally posted on Avalution Consulting’s Blog

If you have less than 500 employees, odds are you don’t have someone working full-time on business continuity. And, unless regulations require you to perform planning in some manner, your organization may not have a business continuity plan at all!

I have a terrific announcement as I post this blog. My friend Bob Arnold, President and Executive Publisher at the Disaster Recovery Journal , invited me to join the DRJ’s blog-community. So, future blogs that I write will be cross-posted with both my normal Wordpress address (www.timbonno.wordpress.com ) as well as at the DRJ ( www.drj.com ). I appreciate Bob’s interest and invitation and look forward to what future discussions may take place with the loyal readers of the DRJ.

I want to start this blog with something I recently read in an email newsletter/solicitation sent to me by a vendor in the recovery services business. The vendor’s message started off with the following … ”There is no hard definition of what constitutes a disaster. Disasters come in all shapes and sizes. Some develop quickly, hitting full-force with little to no warning. While others loom on the horizon for an extended period of time”.

Sunday is cricket day for the Osborne boys during the summer. Last Sunday's match was away at Nether Whitacre, a lovely little village cricket club about an hour's drive from Chez Osborne. We set off with just about enough time to spare with the car loaded up to the gunwales - myself, my two sons, another member of the team, Mrs Oz and Barney, along with four cricket kits and various other accoutrements.

Less than ten minutes into our journey it suddenly became obvious that all was not well with the Ozmobile. It was the sudden lurch, as if we'd been side-swiped by a strong wind, followed by a strange graunching noise that rapidly increased in volume that gave the game away.

I recently came across an article that got me thinking about the never ending struggle for visibility and acceptance our industry seems to have.  And it made me ask if we are approaching the problem correctly or for that matter addressing the right problem.

As Business Continuity professionals we are trained to be analytical and approach problems in a logical, fact based way.  You would think that after this much time someone would have come up with the definitive rational for business continuity. Yet, despite years of developing business cases, performing risk assessments and documenting a multitude of object lessons and justifications it seems that management disinterest and overall lack of attention are still the main complaints I hear. 

In every company there are decision-makers and decision-influencers. Often it is the decision-influencers who see the need for the service/solution and who work to convince the decision-makers to agree and sign the contract.

So, how does this apply when making decisions about your disaster recovery and business continuity plans? What is the normal process for your organization when making decisions that will have a large impact on the longevity and success of your company?

One of the ongoing problems in business continuity is articulating the business case in a way that resonates with executives and others in our organizations and doesn't require a twenty slide PowerPoint presentation.  In an attempt to help, I will periodically post items as I find them in the news or wherever they turn up.  The idea is to give business continuity professionals ideas for informal conversations that highlight both the need for business continuity activities and some potential pitfalls of ignoring them.

On Wednesday, August 25^th, a hardware failure in Virginia's main data center brought the services of multiple state agencies to a halt.  The failure impacted twenty-six of eighty state agencies including the Department of Motor Vehicles and the Department of Social Services, two of the most visible, public facing agencies.  Details can be found in an article from the Richmond Times Dispatch at http://www2.timesdispatch.com/news/2010/aug/27/8/vita27-ar-475161/.  As of Monday morning, August 30^th, three of those agencies still reported outages, including the inability of the DMV to issue driver's licenses.  

If your morning routine always began with "L'eggo My Eggo", the great waffle shortage of 2009 probably left you missing that warm buttery and syrupy goodness.  Considering that Eggos account for nearly 70% of frozen waffles, the shortage was treated as nothing less than a national calamity.  With a flooded plant in Atlanta and broken bakery in Tennessee, Americans across the nation were left with empty freezers and a bad taste in their mouths when Kellogg Company was unable to produce some of their favorite breakfast foods.

A recent full-page ad in USA Today (see photo) prompted me to revisit the great waffle shortage of 2009, as it provides such a clear and tasty case for business continuity planning.  Heavy rains in October 2009 kicked-off Eggo's sabbatical from kitchen tables across the country.  One Kellogg spokesperson wrote "We are experiencing temporary Eggo supply constraints caused by a confluence of events [caused by] flooding at our Atlanta facility as well as equipment issues necessitating extensive enhancements and repairs at our largest waffle bakery facility."  As a result, Kellogg's added a banner to the top of their website that stated, "Some of your favorite Eggo products are out of stock nationally. We are working hard to fix this short-term issue".  Little did they know that "short-term" would actually become nine months.