Other then your employees your data is probably the most important resource your company has. While this is the case, most companies do not have an adequate disaster recovery plan (DRP) in place.
Imagine the scenario. You come into the office Monday morning to find out that you can’t get access to the server that is storing the big proposal you spent all last week writing. You also notice everyone else is having the same problems. You go to the server room and try to reboot the server but all you see is a screen that states the hard drives can not be found. You look at the tape in the backup tape drive and notice it is ejected. You can’t remember the last time it was checked. Panic mode starts to set in.
This is something that every company must fear and plan for. You should never have to worry about losing large amounts of data especially important data. In order to have a good DRP there are few steps you have to take.
Understanding
The first step that needs to be done is understand that a disaster recovery plan is important. After telling the story above most companies agree that they need to have a plan in place.
Planning
The second step and one of the more important steps is planning. If you don’t plan effectively then your DRP could become useless. This stage should involve more then one person. You really need to get involvement from all departments. A group should be created with a representative from each department in the company. Your DRP should not only include data backup but also power outage and natural disaster scenarios. There is not just one way to create a DRP. Every company is different and needs to create a plan that fits them.
Implementing
After you feel you have a good plan in place the next step is to implement it. You may need to purchase additional hardware and/or software. After you feel you have everything in place the first thing you’ll want to do is test it.
Continuing
Once the plan has been implemented the final step is continuance. This step sometimes involves going back through the first three steps. Maybe your company bought out another company. This could greatly affect your plan and you should start back from the beginning again. You’ll also want to do periodic test of the DRP. If you are backing up your data then you should restore data from time to time. The last thing you’ll want to do is after you implement the plan is think that everything is fine and never think about it again.
Don’t let your data go unprotected. If you are unsure how or if your system is being protected then you need to have someone help you formulate a plan so the above scenario will not happen to you.
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