What Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery (BCDR) Is and Why You Need a Strategy

Business continuity and disaster recovery (BCDR) are concepts within a business that prepare them for many types of disasters. Business continuity focuses on operating during disruptions, while disaster recovery helps plan how to fix disruptions. Companies must consider both ideas to create an effective BCDR strategy.

Tekie Geek offers customized solutions for business technologies, including managed IT services and co-managed IT services. We aim to help businesses craft the right strategies to protect them from harm. Here, we discuss what a BCDR strategy is, the difference between business continuity and disaster recovery, the benefits of having an effective BCDR plan, and the different things to consider when crafting a strategy.

What Is a Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery (BCDR) Strategy?

Businesses are susceptible to many risks and errors. External risks, like natural disasters, power outages, and fires, can occur for any reason and without warning. Internal risks, like data corruption or loss, can blindside businesses, especially those unprepared for this kind of disaster. When this happens, it can severely impact business processes. Companies can become disrupted by many factors, including:

While these events can happen anytime, business owners can prepare by identifying these risks and strategizing ways to continue business processes amid these challenges. This is called a business continuity and disaster recovery (BCDR) strategy.

Business Continuity vs. Disaster Recovery: What’s the Difference?

While similar, business continuity and disaster recovery involve different processes. Business owners must understand these differences to develop an effective BCDR strategy. Business continuity addresses how businesses will function during and after disaster strikes. This includes instances like data breaches, power outages, or natural disasters. Business continuity plans can involve moving locations temporarily, installing generators to combat power outages, and other strategies.

Disaster recovery is how businesses plan to deal with the aftermath of a disaster. In the case of a natural disaster or fire, plans may include rebuilding efforts and moving operations to another location. For cyber security threats, plans may involve restoring data and returning systems to normal.

While both ideas are similar, business continuity and disaster recovery focus on two different aspects of business recovery. But both plans work together to provide all-around business protection. Businesses must take the time to strategize their BCDR strategy to get ahead of disasters and keep business operations smooth.

Why Have a BCDR Strategy?

Business owners have much on their plate when running a business. In the hustle and bustle of managing a business and ensuring customer satisfaction, it can be easy to forget to plan how to continue operations if disaster strikes.

Failing to come up with a BCDR strategy can severely disrupt business processes, which can leave a negative impact on customers and drive competitor sales up. Not having a BCDR strategy can also make dealing with disasters more stressful. Alongside gathering the necessary insurance information and figuring out repair costs, business owners will also have to worry about how they will continue their operations.

Businesses that already have a BCDR strategy in place will be better prepared to handle these situations. They can implement their new policies and strategies effectively to continue operations with minimal disruptions.

Data is another important aspect of a business that business owners must protect. All businesses, including smaller ones, are susceptible to data breaches and disruptions. A BCDR strategy covers what to do in the event of an external threat and also highlights plans for handling cyber security threats.

Businesses with an effective BCDR strategy know what to do during any type of disaster, meaning business operations can continue as normal. The right BCDR strategy also helps businesses stay compliant regarding data and recovery.

Things to Consider for Your BCDR Strategy

There are many things to consider before creating your business’s BCDR strategy. A BCDR strategy is only effective if business owners know the factors that leave their business susceptible to risks. This means they’ll want to think about every aspect of their business when crafting a BCDR strategy, including:

Systems, Devices, and Workloads

The systems and devices a business uses are essential to operating business processes. Employees must monitor these systems to ensure nothing goes wrong. However, this can be a difficult task for one employee to undertake. Humans make mistakes, and systems can fail for many reasons.

Having a BCDR strategy minimizes these risks and protects essential business information and data. It also keeps devices and systems in the workplace safe from mishaps.

Accessibility of Important Data

Systems store data on multiple platforms, like remote sites, cloud services, or on-premise devices. This ensures data is always accessible. However, IT departments can only protect so many of these complex processes. A BCDR strategy can protect data on all platforms to keep business operations running smoothly.

Using BCDR to Reduce Downtime

Technological mishaps can happen to anyone, even if businesses prepare with advanced technology. When they occur, it can disrupt business processes greatly. Companies can stay ahead with the right BCDR strategy. Having one reduces the effects of data loss and minimizes downtime.

Protection and Security for External and Internal Risks

It can be challenging for businesses to avoid risks without knowing their internal and external threats. Having a BCDR strategy can help you determine these risks and proactively find ways to minimize them. BCDR technology consistently monitors all data and technology to identify risks and alert businesses before they can disrupt business processes.

Deduplication

Businesses hold much data. But oftentimes, the data they store can be copies of similar files. The cost of storing data can be high, and excess data in systems can slow down business operations and cause storage problems. Businesses will want to consider browsing their existing data and undergoing a deduplication process. Deduplication is when businesses delete duplicated or copied files.

Employee Data Access

Another aspect businesses must think of is the accessibility of their data to employees. Some information does not need to be shared with other employees. However, other information may be essential to completing business processes. Businesses can use many tools and policies to restrict data access to certain employees while giving others access to data to complete jobs.

Find Business Protection Services at Tekie Geek

Businesses must have a business continuity and disaster recovery (BCDR) strategy to keep up with competitors and protect their business. It also maintains customer satisfaction and builds customer trust. Implementing the right BCDR strategy is easy with the help of Tekie Geek. We provide insights into creating the best and most robust backup and BCDR strategy. Our team has the knowledge and experience to take on your business and its unique needs.

Businesses across New York and New Jersey can receive assistance with crafting the right BCDR strategy. To learn more about our services, contact us today.

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