Business Resumption and Disaster Recovery Planning
We were approached by a large financial institution to assist them in their Business Resumption and Disaster Recovery planning efforts. For the last year we have been working with them on developing, implementing and testing an effective BRP/DRP program.

Specifically, we have been involved in the following initiatives:

Business Resumption Planning - Each of the client's business units were asked to rate their criticality and to develop their respective business resumption plans.

Application Inventory - An enterprise-wide application inventory was developed.

Technology Inventory - An enterprise-wide technology data base has been created.

Risk Assessment / Gap Analysis - A risk assessment and gap analysis was performed on each of the technology components.

Mitigation strategies - Business Resumption mitigation strategies were developed for each of the technology components.

Budget planning - A detailed budget was created for each of the mitigation strategies.

Business Unit testing - Business Resumption plans are continually being updated and tested.

Processes and Procedure- Hundreds of processes and procedures have been developed and tested. Hundreds more still need to be developed.

Testing environment and testing - An environment was designed and established to facilitate business unit and technology testing.

Communication and Awareness - A corporate-wide communications plan, to be used in the event of a disaster, was developed and tested. Additionally, numerous articles have been written and published highlighting the importance of business resumption planning and testing. Lastly, a Business Resumption Planning Officer has been identified for each business unit to facilitate planning and communication.

Additional projects - Ongoing projects include the relocation of dozens of servers, preparing the readiness of employee and technology recovery locations, improving backup and restore capabilities, and implementing mitigation strategies for critical applications.