A disaster recovery (DR) plan incorporates a set of clear guidelines and comprehensive instructions on how to respond to a disaster in all its phases (before, during, and after it occurs) in order to mitigate the catastrophic impact on your business. The measures to limit the consequences of a disaster are included in the step-by-step plan so that the organization can continue to function or swiftly restart mission-critical operations.
Why is a Disaster Recovery Plan Significant to Your Business
Nowadays, cybercrime and security breaches have become more complicated. Hence, it is critical for an enterprise to devise and establish effective data recovery and protection strategies. The potential to respond swiftly to issues can reduce downtime and mitigate financial and reputational damage. DRPs allow businesses to guarantee that they comply with all regulations while also giving an explicit roadmap to recovery.
“According to the National Archives & Records Administration in Washington, 93 percent of organizations that lose data access for ten days or more due to a disaster file for bankruptcy within a year.”
Disaster recovery planning is a complicated process that should be addressed with caution by a responsible business owner. As a result, you should employ a disaster recovery checklist that lays out the procedures you will need to do to handle the disaster effectively.
If appropriate actions are not taken immediately after a disaster, it can substantially damage your firm. A robust disaster recovery plan checklist is essential when proceeding to a business back up and running after a disaster.
Objectives of a Disaster Recovery Plan
In order to eliminate financial losses, make sure your disaster recovery plan includes the resources needed to:
- Mitigate the risk by conducting a risk assessment to reveal the vulnerabilities in your current system.
- Devise plans and strategies to resume operations swiftly without the need for physical access.
- Your disaster recovery plan should comply with the regulations to save you from the penalties.
- Your disaster recovery plan should build trust in your stakeholders in your firm.
List of Elements to Incorporate in Your Disaster Recovery Plan Checklist
Determine Your RTO and RPO
Establishing disaster recovery objectives is the first step on the disaster recovery plan checklist. The recovery time objective (RTO) and recovery point objective (RPO) are the most significant parameters in disaster recovery planning.
The recovery time objective (RTO) specifies how long it will take to recover from a disaster and restore normal business activities. On the other hand, RPO determines the maximum amount of data loss that may be tolerated over time.
You must determine which business services and operations are the most significant to your business and set appropriate recovery goals. RTO and RPO assist in determining which disaster recovery tactics to implement in order to accomplish desired disaster recovery outcomes.
Create a List of Your Hardware and Software
Make a complete list of all of your hardware and software. Classify each application into one of the following three categories:
- Critical applications that are essential for your business operations
- The software’s that you will use in a day for your business tasks
- Applications you won’t use for at least a few days
You will get to know which applications to prioritize in the event of a disaster if you define your most critical applications. Constantly update this list whenever any applications are installed or removed.
Identify the Stakeholders
The next step is to specify everyone who needs to be updated in the event of a disaster. Many firms have a list of stakeholders, which is an excellent place to start identifying all of the people you will need to notify in the event of a disaster. You should also identify members of your PR and marketing team, vendors, third-party providers, and even significant customers, in addition to people involved in the actual recovery from a disaster.
Create a Disaster Recovery Site
There’s always the chance that a disaster may severely harm your production center, making it difficult to resume activities at the primary site and forcing you to migrate mission-critical workloads to another location.
As a result, the disaster recovery plan checklist suggests that you create a disaster recovery site for the purpose of relocating vital data, applications, personnel, and physical resources in case of an emergency. The backup location should have sufficient hardware and software to handle the most critical workloads.
Compile All Infrastructure Documentation
Despite the fact that your technical teams assigned to activate DR processes have the necessary skills and expertise for relocating activities to your target DR site, infrastructure documentation is still required, especially in the event of a disaster. Even the most experienced engineers prefer to follow infrastructure documentation during a disaster.
Below listed are some of the critical things that should be listed in your documentation:
- Mapped network connections
- Complete setup of systems and their utilization
- Storage and databases
- Cloud templates
Store Sensitive Data in a Remote Location
An unanticipated loss of critical data (sensitive data, PII, etc.,) can cause business disruption and damage your company’s reputation. Furthermore, it is incredibly difficult to recover critical information. As a result, you should make sure that all critical data are safely backed up and preserved in a remote location.
Devise a Crisis Communication Plan
In case a disaster occurs, you will need a concrete strategy for communication with employees, vendors, suppliers, and consumers. Provide a statement that your public relations team may post on your website and social media sites, along with a contact number to connect with for more information.
Perform Continuous Practice Tests
It’s critical to schedule failover testing for your DR site on a regular basis. Perform practice assessments to test your plan and watch for red flags, such as malfunctioning backup hardware or a poor internet connection that won’t allow you to recover your data in a timely manner.
You should also double-check your risk assessments, personnel lists, and inventories to make sure they are all up-to-date. Performance testing is also necessary to see whether your secondary location is capable of handling the business load.
Wrapping Up
Make sure your disaster recovery plan checklist incorporates data regarding the DR strategy to be executed in the event of a disaster. Recovering a complete IT infrastructure, especially in large organizations, can be a challenging task. Since every firm is unique, you should wisely select a disaster recovery strategy that meets your business goals and expectations.
