Data today not Desk tomorrow
Better risk management though enabling people and knowledge

In 2005 a string of major events brought sharply into focus the need for organisations to be vigilant and well planned in preparation for their 'worst case scenario'.  Hurricanes Rita and Katrina, and the Bunsfield oil depot fire alone disrupted services, forced the closure of many businesses and meant loss of revenue to thousands more.

These disasters highlighted that, in the 24/7 economy, where customers can choose to move their business not just to the company round the corner, but to a company on the other side of the globe, the speed at which organisations can bounce back from a setback, regardless of its scale, to deliver 'business as usual', is now critical to its survival. As a result, faced with this volatility, many businesses are now reassessing their continuity plans, only to find that while their business has evolved, the plans in place to support it have not.

It is generally acknowledged that a company’s most valuable assets are its people, followed by its knowledge. Without the former, the latter is redundant, and without the latter, the former will struggle to operate at their most efficient best. This is particularly true in a fast-changing risk/disaster situation, where the human brain is unequalled in its ability to share and use knowledge to deal with new or unique problems as they arise.  As a result, if modern businesses are to survive, protecting and connecting these two critical assets in times of disaster is paramount.

Modern approach to risk management
This modern approach to risk management is one supported by the analyst house Gartner which, in a recent report on Avian Bird Flu, emphasises the need to provide staff with access to data rather than a desk. Forrester too advocates 'untethering' information workers, highlighting the role, home and mobile workers will play in the businesses of the future.

The potential impact of this could have become all too apparent on July 7th last year. Despite the horror of the morning’s events, comparatively little damage was caused to London’s economic capability. The disruption and the immediate impact on business continuity in the capital was small and short-lived, with only brief shortages caused in staff resources. Most of London’s workers – and particularly those in the City - were already at their desks, and most got home safely that evening and were back at work the next morning. The impact of a desk-oriented business culture would have been very different had the bombers struck 60 minutes earlier during rush hour, and brought more of the capital’s transportation system to a standstill.

Such an approach requires a step change, of course, to traditional methods of continuity planning, still deployed by many businesses, that focus  predominantly around data and office location back up. Viewed in the light of events such as 7/7 and threats of pandemics such as Avian Bird Flu - where government advice is to not congregate in large groups, and so where disaster planning is required, to counter the effects of the inability of individuals to attend, or function at a place of work - then the focus on protecting centralised infrastructure, rather than protecting and enabling staff, is questionable. Indeed, as organisations become more de-centralised over time, traditional continuity approaches need to be examined.  Rather than putting whole budgets into duplicating IT infrastructures, the risk may be more effectively reduced by diverting at least part of that budget into pursuing agility which, in turn, can be a powerful component of a continuity strategy, as well as delivering day-to-day benefit.

This view can be reinforced by considering that according to IDC, a predicted 5-9 per cent of total IT spending is on continuity planning, guarding against threats that are, statistically, unlikely ever to effect  a majority of businesses. The same investment could be much better spent addressing a much broader set of everyday risks, that though seemingly less dramatic, are still as serious in their effect on the organisation.

For instance, in 2004 over 176 million workdays were lost in the UK due to sickness, mostly down to minor ailments or the need to care for ailing children. In addition, according to the UK Department of Transport, traffic on roads increased 84 per cent between 1980 and 2004, resulting in unpredictable commuting, slower journey times and countless delayed meetings. Public transport can be unreliable and the threat of airborne terrorism has introduced further uncertainties and delays into aviation schedules.

Predictable and unavoidable
Illness, travel delays and other daily events are both mostly predictable and unavoidable. Lost hours and days have a cumulative effect and, over a sustained period, steadily increase the competitive risk to which companies expose themselves.  Yet little has been done to address them until now.

However, the opportunities offered by the blurring of traditional work patterns between 9-5, five-days-a-week office hours and the 24/7 availability of the home office/mobile office, coupled with increased legislation to protect the individual and family, have forced both staff and employers to re-examine the way that they work.

As such, more companies are now making the investment in home and mobile working; establishing flexible working policies and tools that enable people to perform their function from any location, and with a variety of devices.  These changes are taking place hand in hand with changes such as the virtualisation and distribution of server and storage resources. As they do so, organisations are also investing simultaneously in a robust, flexible continuity strategy, since the requirements of a home or mobile worker in a fast-moving organisation, are identical to those of a key worker responding to a crisis. Whether that crisis is because of a terrorist attack or a suddenly sick child, remote. access to the company’s telephone system, corporate directory and secure information resources, enable key workers to drive the business forward regardless.

‘Built-in’ rather than ‘bolt-on’
So, simply by investing in flexible business processes, forward thinking companies make themselves more agile, efficient and responsive to unpredictable global markets. They improve the working environment for staff and simultaneously prepare themselves to deal with threats to their survival at all levels. This is `built-in` rather than `bolt-on` resilience.

The all round benefits of this strategy are best illustrated by the Government's claim that during an epidemic, the number of calls to local authority and health services will increase exponentially, while the number of staff available to respond will reduce dramatically. The question of how fewer people can take more calls with fewer resources is not just a question a chief executive asks in the event of a crisis, but an every day issue organisations must address to maintain their market share or deliver on targets.

Continuity by design
In light of this more modern, built-in approach to continuity planning, the budgets spent currently on traditional continuity systems and data centre back up seems woefully misplaced. Logicalis calls this new approach 'Continuity by Design’; supporting modern working practice, enabling competitive business drive, and simultaneously protecting against threats from the mundane to the extreme. Regardless of location or threat, with a Continuity by Design strategy in place, even if a business is hit by its worst case scenario, where people are enabled to work wherever they are located, there is now no reason it should not be 'business as usual'.

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