DR Policies

Any business or organisation can experience some form of serious incident that can prevent it from continuing normal operations. This can be in the form of fire, flood, health or major network outage. MintTec can help you develop a policy to ensure there is an agreed contingency plan to keep you open for business. This plan is normally formalised by the following steps:

Stage 1: Impact assessment. Preparation of a comprehensive list of the potentially serious incidents that could affect the normal operations of the business. Each 'incident' is then graded as to its probability rating and potential impact severity level. These details will enable a framework plan in the context of the real needs of the organisation.

Stage 2: Developing the plan. The structure of the plan can now be established using the priorities agreed in the Impact Assessment. This plan will outline a range of milestones to move the organisation from its disrupted status towards a return to normal operations. The first important milestone is the process which deals with the immediate aftermath of the disaster, with following stages to determine which critical business functions need to be resumed and in what order. The plan will of necessity be detailed, and will identify key individuals who should be familiar with their duties under the plan.

Stage 3: Testing the plan. Once the development stage has been completed, where possible a pre testing should be carried out. The testing process itself must be properly planned and should be carried out in a suitable environment to reproduce authentic conditions in so far as this is feasible. The test procedures would then be documented.

Stage 4: Maintaining the plan. The plan must always be kept up to date and applicable to current business circumstances. This means that any changes to the business process or changes to the relative importance of each part of the business process must be properly reflected within the plan. This would be undertaken by the assigned 'owner' who would be responsible for ensuring that the plan is maintained and updated regularly and should therefore ensure that information concerning changes to the business process are properly communicated. Any changes or amendments made to the plan must be fully tested. Personnel should also be kept abreast of such changes in so far as they affect their duties and responsibilities.