Business Continuity and Disaster Planning

Can your business continue to function if the power goes out? For how long?

Small UPS units for PCs and servers will generally give you a short period of backup power. Usually enough time to finish what's currently being worked on, save everything and gracefully shut down the system.

Are all the network devices attached to UPS units?

Without power to the hubs, switches, routers, etc. the network is down when the power goes out.

Is network availability important?

This may vary based on the type of network, the particular business, the computer resources needed, as well as other factors.

Are UPS units the best/only solution?

Depending on several factors there comes a point at which the use of multiple UPS units no longer makes sense and a backup power generation system would be a better solution. Whether that backup power be some renewable power source such as wind, hydro or solar with suitable batteries for such a system, or a fuel based (diesel, propane, etc.) generator also depends upon various things. How about situations beyond the occasional thunderstorm knocking out power for a couple hours? Can the business just shut down for a few days (weeks? months??) or must it keep going no matter what?

What about recovering from natural disasters? Man-made disasters?

A data backup plan is quite a common feature in business computing environments. I hesitate to say that every business has a data backup system only because over the years I have seen small business networks that did not back up data at all. Though more common is an insufficient backup strategy. For example, only backing up some degree of irreplacable data but not all of it or getting the important business data but not including important network, operating system, and software configuration data which could greatly increase the time and effort required to restore the system. Another mistake I have observed in implementation of a backup strategy is the failure to verify that it does in fact work. Going through the motions to make sure the backups happen while not verifying that the data can be retrieved may ruin someone's day. While most software for performing backups nowadays will verify that the data was properly saved, it cannot guarantee that a system can be rebuilt with just that backed up data. In some cases just knowing what needs to happen to for recovery to work is sufficient, while in others testing the system to make sure that it does work like it's supposed to may be called for.

Is a copy of the backup data and software kept off-site? Should it be? If offsite backup is part of the plan, is it secure?

There are many questions to be answered and several scenarios to consider in developing disaster and continuity plans. The factors involved are as unique as any business is and can require a complex analysis to develop the right one for your individual business. If you don't currently have such planning in place or just want to assure that your current plan meets your needs, I invite you to contact me to arrange a free initial consultation.