Why IT Systems Should be Front and Centre When it Comes to Disaster Recovery

Posted By on July 26th, 2019

Did you know that the 26th July is Systems Administrator Appreciation Day? A day to appreciate those who work hard on keeping the IT systems running across your business.

And whilst you are appreciating the team who implement and monitor your IT systems, it is also a good time to consider the central role that IT plays in your business as a whole. Perhaps your website is your shop window where people come to browse and purchase your product, your staff will most likely work from your IT network,  you store your customer data using IT systems and your customer contact centre may make use of IT in their everyday work.

If you were to suffer an IT outage, it is likely that most, if not all of your business functions would be affected and, in some cases, unable to carry out their work entirely.

What may cause an IT outage?

Like everything, IT systems are susceptible to suffering outages for many reasons:

  • Human error
  • System updates
  • Cyber attacks 

How can you prepare for an IT outage?

Whilst you can’t predict when an IT outage may occur or what the exact cause will be, there are steps you can take to prepare for the worst happening.

One of these steps is having an effective disaster recovery plan in place. A disaster recovery plan should be relatively technical in detail and provide you with the steps and information you need to get your business-critical systems re-established as quickly as possible.

What are the other benefits of having a disaster recovery plan?

Other benefits of having a disaster recovery plan in place include:

Minimising the amount of downtime – suffering an IT outage can mean your website goes down as well as other means for customers to get in touch with you. All of which can affect your income and reputation. Having an efficient plan in place will mean you are prepared to act quickly

Protecting your customers data – GDPR has put a real focus on businesses responsibilities when it comes to protecting customer data.

Managing the risk of cybercrime – these can cause major disruption and if you do suffer one cause a sense of panic across the business. This is less likely to be the case if you have given prior thought to the risk and how you would respond if you were to suffer an attack

If you don’t currently have a disaster recovery plan in place now may be a good time to think about creating one. Read our recent blog on what is a disaster recovery plan and how to go about creating one.

If your businesses success is reliant on IT systems, it may also be worth considering the services of a disaster recovery specialist like First Recovery. We can provide support to your business at time of disaster, including relocating you to a recovery centre and providing back up IT systems. If you have any questions about our service or how we can help contact us today.