The BCDR Link Template – What’s It All About?
Business continuity (BC) and disaster recovery (DR) are important business activities that establish processes to protect a business’s people, process, technology and facilities in the face of a potentially disruptive event. BC/DR information is collected and organized in a BC/DR Plan that is completed and stored for future use. If you do experience a disruptive event, this plan becomes the focus of those charged with managing your organization through the event.
Many books, articles and presentations have been written on how to create BC and DR plans. The template provided by the BCDR Link Service builds on years of experience creating BC/DR plans, blends in the new domestic and global BC/DR standards, and tops it all off with a generous helping of good BC/DR practice. Using this template can help you complete a plan part-time as you gather information. Most users of the template work at completing it over the course of a few weeks. Because this is an on-line BC/DR plan, you can come back at any time to add or change information. You can share the template with other users and ask them to complete or review certain sections. And as your business changes, you should access the template to document new and altered information.
The template is designed for quick completion by providing extensive “ready-to-use” content that can be accepted as is or edited rapidly to fit your organization’s needs. It also provides fill-in-the-blank entries, text boxes, and tables for you to quickly enter data. In many cases, your organization may already have documents that provide BC/DR information, such as a network topology diagram, a call tree diagram, or an evacuation plan. In this case, it is quicker and easier to upload relevant documents for that section of the BC/DR plan rather than type information in. Every section of the plan allows you to upload and later download documents. This template will help you complete a workable, ready-to-use plan in a reasonable time frame.
Is this a DR Plan?
The BC/DR Plan template provided covers more than a DR (Disaster Recovery) Plan. DR Plans tend to be about the IT data center and describe how to protect and restore the servers, networks, and software applications a business needs to operate. A BC/DR Plan is about more than the business technology. It coves emergency management of people and processes.
Does this Template comply with BC/DR Standards?
Yes, the template is designed around ISO 22301:2012, the global BC standard. It is also consistent with ISO 27031:2011, a global DR standard. The template author is a certified Business Continuity professional with 30 years of experience.
Who Should Use This Template?
Anyone who has been assigned the task of creating a business continuity and/or disaster recovery plan for their organization will benefit from using this template. If you already have a BC/DR plan, the template will help you review the existing plan(s) and identify ways you can improve them.
Why Should You Use This Template?
Following the steps in this template will help you quickly and efficiently produce plan documents that are easy to understand, actionable, and consistent with established industry standards and good practices. In addition, producing BC/DR plans that are consistent with industry standards will help you survive an audit of your plans!
What Do You Need to Get Started?
You can start this process with literally nothing on hand or you can gather BC/DR documents if you have them. Work with the template and soon you’ll have a completed BC/DR plan.