{"id":811,"date":"2011-09-12T09:30:05","date_gmt":"2011-09-12T16:30:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.redwireservices.com\/?p=811"},"modified":"2014-07-25T16:26:55","modified_gmt":"2014-07-25T23:26:55","slug":"disaster-recovery-plan-does-my-business-need-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.redwireservices.com\/disaster-recovery-plan-does-my-business-need-one","title":{"rendered":"Disaster Recovery Plan: Does My Business Need One?"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Every business should at least take basic steps to be prepared for disruptions, and the Disaster Recovery Plan<\/a>\u00a0(DRP) accomplishes that for your computing systems. \u00a0It’s not just being prepared for the next “big one,” it’s about being\u00a0prepared\u00a0for eventualities such as power outages, equipment failures, and human error (such as accidental file deletion).<\/p>\n

If you are\u00a0dependent\u00a0on computer systems in your business, you’ve likely had a computing “disaster” in which a DRP would have saved your company time, money, and a lot of frustration. \u00a0We hear examples of this almost daily — the latest one from a sales organization that had to do without email for three days due to a system configuration or hardware problem. \u00a0We do not need to tell you how frustrated the sales folks were that they couldn’t access their email for days, and it could have been avoided with an up to date disaster recovery plan.<\/p>\n

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Image seen in April 2011 during Reddit service outage.<\/p><\/div>\n

Other\u00a0situations that could have been avoided include newer startup companies hosting their websites on the popular\u00a0Amazon Web Services Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)<\/a>,\u00a0such as\u00a0reddit<\/a>. So far this year EC2 has suffered at least two significant outages, which was a wake up call to many depending on their services.<\/p>\n

We happen to still like, and use Amazon EC2 services, but these outages have shown that their offering is not bullet proof and contingency plans are\u00a0absolutely\u00a0in order. \u00a0In fact, Amazon\u00a0recommends\u00a0them and has cautioned users to utilize multiple\u00a0availability\u00a0zones<\/a>\u00a0even before their problems earlier this year. \u00a0Users who took their advice experienced little if any disruption in service, and creating a Disaster Recover Plan for your EC2 hosted application will bring these issue to light, giving you a chance to correct them before it becomes a problem.<\/p>\n

According to a 2008 report, nearly half of the companies with a DRP executed at least part of their plan that year [2008 Continuity Insights and KPMG Advisory Services Business Continuity Management Benchmarking Report<\/a>]. \u00a0This shows that having a plan is a great idea, even if your business is lucky enough to avoid a natural disaster.<\/p>\n

We Have a Disaster Recovery Plan, I’m Done, Right?<\/h2>\n

Congratulations, but you are not finished. \u00a0The reason why DRPs work so well is they bring issues to light that can be easily corrected now, before a disaster strikes. \u00a0After your DRP is complete, the business must ensure the objectives set forth in the document are met and that all the recovery processes specified actually work. \u00a0In other words, we need to carefully review the DRP over and over again, until we are\u00a0satisfied due\u00a0diligence\u00a0is complete.<\/p>\n

Once you’ve done your due\u00a0diligence, we still need to perform regular testing and updates. We\u00a0recommend\u00a0that the DRP is reviewed quarterly<\/strong> with all involved parties to ensure no changes to the technology, recovery infrastructure, staff, or vendors have been made. If changes have been made, then that portion of the DRP must be tested to ensure the processes are still accurate. If changes are needed, update the document accordingly.<\/p>\n

At least once a year<\/strong>, and when the first DRP is written, we recommend all businesses perform a full disaster recovery exercise. \u00a0This test usually occurs over a weekend or other slow business time and involves running all critical business applications at an alternate site according to your plan. \u00a0This exercise is key to illuminating any deficiencies in your plan, and provides your technical team and management confidence that the process will work when it is needed for real. \u00a0It’s rare that these tests go 100% according to plan, so expect to learn something during each DR exercise.<\/p>\n

Get Started Now<\/h2>\n

We hope you are now assured that a DR plan has value. \u00a0It’s important to make a\u00a0commitment to creating your plan now, it is all to easy to put off for another day, and pretty soon it’s too late. \u00a0Every business needs at least a basic DRP.<\/p>\n

Need help deciding on what is right for your\u00a0disaster recovery plan, or need help implementing an archive system or backup strategy? \u00a0Contact\u00a0Red Wire Services<\/a>\u00a0at\u00a0(206) 829-8621<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Every business should at least take basic steps to be prepared for disruptions, and the Disaster Recovery Plan\u00a0(DRP) accomplishes that for your computing systems. \u00a0It’s not just being prepared for the next “big one,” it’s about being\u00a0prepared\u00a0for eventualities such as … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[31,3],"tags":[33,37,59,54,62,34],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.redwireservices.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/811"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.redwireservices.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.redwireservices.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.redwireservices.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.redwireservices.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=811"}],"version-history":[{"count":20,"href":"https:\/\/www.redwireservices.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/811\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1493,"href":"https:\/\/www.redwireservices.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/811\/revisions\/1493"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.redwireservices.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=811"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.redwireservices.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=811"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.redwireservices.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=811"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}