Businesses of varying sizes heavily rely on a robust IT infrastructure for streamlined business processes. EDI or electronic data interchange, desktop computers, wireless devices, laptops, and the list goes long on when we talk about IT’s involvement in the business landscape. Companies use effective IT management to remove complexities from the system and also prevent unwanted problems. However, how well can you rate your internal IT department’s backup plan if anything goes wrong? How will your IT infrastructure respond to an unplanned incident? Any unexpected technology-related problem, whether natural or human-induced, can cause system failure or damage the IT infrastructure.
There are different types of disaster events that companies address in their disaster recovery planning. In this blog, we will discuss disaster recovery and how it’s essential for various companies.
What Is Disaster Recovery?
DR or disaster recovery plan encompasses detailed instructions on how to respond to any unplanned disaster or incident such as hardware failures, system failures, cyber-attacks, power outages, or natural disasters. Disaster recovery enables the continuation of vital IT systems supporting critical business processes leveraging tools, policies, and procedures. Disaster recovery focuses on decreasing system downtimes and minimizes losses by ensuring rapid recovery. Unlike a business continuity plan that keeps essential business aspects functional despite significant disruptions, disaster recovery only centralizes technology systems.
With an effective disaster recovery plan in place, company owners can stay stress-free about anything from a ransomware attack to a natural disaster such as an earthquake. Servers can go down anytime due to a natural disaster, or businesses can lose data due to equipment failure or cyber-attacks. Disaster recovery includes replicating computer processing and data in a different location, unaffected by the disaster events.
Importance of Disaster Recovery Planning
Technology is always vulnerable to hiccups, and humans are the biggest source of errors. A minor issue can result in a slowdown or even system failure. We can’t foresee what’s coming, but hardware failure, human errors, and natural disasters can happen anytime. When running a business, you should expect the best and prepare for the worst. Planning and implementing an effective disaster recovery strategy can offer several operational benefits including:
Swift Business Continuity: Businesses or companies from diverse industries heavily rely on IT systems for smooth operations. 43% of companies that experienced catastrophic business data loss never reopened whereas 29% closed within two years. A disaster recovery plan is also termed as a subset of business continuity plan and for obvious reasons. Having a DR plan in place allows rapid recovery of these systems and help businesses get back on track in no time.
Less Expenditure: A proactive approach towards potential disruptive events can save your business a lot of money. To give you an idea, disaster recovery stats suggest that small companies lose as much as $8,000, mid-size organizations lose around $74,000, and large enterprises lose an estimated $700,000 in just one hour of downtime. With so much relying on IT systems nowadays, spending a little to build an effective disaster recovery plan is no match to the unwanted expenses you may encounter later due to disruptive events.
Client Satisfaction: You can hurt your business reputation by falsely claiming a 24-hour customer service. Losing customers is just a matter of two missed service requests, and an IT system failure can leave your customers puzzled. A disaster recovery plan can save you from all the bad reviews you may otherwise garnish.
Conclusion
A key system or network failure, unexpected shutdown, malicious attacks, and several other disasters are unavoidable. However, having a disaster recovery plan in place helps small businesses to limit the potential damage and maintain operational efficiency. To discuss a disaster plan for your business with Endeavor IT Services, get in touch now.