An entrepreneur running a small business, you may think that you are always prepared for the unexpected. But you can say the same for your small business. The majority of individuals view important things like the IBM business continuity program as common sense, instead of something that requires planning. Nevertheless, whenever things go wrong, they’ll be the first one to notice the mistakes of their ways. Here is what you need to know about business continuity planning.
What is the IBM Business Continuity Plan?
A business continuity strategy details the process that will keep your business operations running smoothly or restoring them quickly if there is a disaster.
Threats to IBM Business Continuity
Based on your specific business and the level of risks, every company tends to have unique primary threats to their business. That is why you need to conduct a risk assessment before you can assemble a business continuity.
Even though you might need to have a viable strategy for all possible outcomes, these threats are common business disruptors. Watch out for them.
1. Worldwide Pandemics
A global pandemic can throw a wrench in your business strategies from every direction and angle. For instance, since the outbreak of COVID 19, many companies worldwide have been affected, whereby most of them are out of business now. With workers made to remain at home and work from there, to increase demands for some products and lessened supply because of manufacturing disruption and shutdown across the whole supply chain.
One of the essential strategies to implement when there is an unforeseen worldwide pandemic is how your workers will interact and conduct business far from the site. It’s essential to have alternatives for supply in case the supply chain is shut down.
2. Natural Calamities
A natural calamity is anything that is weather-related, like hurricanes, tsunamis, and tornados. Or natural phenomena such as wildfire, volcanic eruption, and earthquake. These kinds of calamities are hard to envisage and can onset in a few seconds. They can damage structures and everything inside and disrupt the supply changes through the affected zones.
3. Utility Outage
Power shortage, loss of communication lines, and water shutoff can lead to serious disruptions to daily business operations. This will damage physical properties and lose service and productivity.
4. Cybersecurity
A cyberattack is a computer-based attack on technical assets. The ransomware attack, SQL injection, distributed denial of service, and data theft are some of the examples of cyberattacks. Once you have been attacked, your technical infrastructure will be at a restricted functionality until the problem is solved. Even worse, you might lose access to your business data if you didn’t have a data backup.
Benefits of IBM Business Continuity
- Maintaining business operations
- Building client confidence
- Preserving your reputation and brand
- Protecting your supply chain
- Mitigating financial risk
- Can help you achieve a competitive edge
