Disasters, whether natural or man-made, can hit your business without warning, causing major disruptions that can derail operations and create significant challenges. 

In today’s data-driven world, such disruptions can be especially devastating. What’s the solution? A disaster recovery plan. 

Keep reading to discover everything you need to know about disaster recovery plans and how Inspired IT can help your business stay prepared.

What is a disaster recovery plan?

Think of a disaster recovery plan as your business’s safety net. It’s a detailed strategy designed to help you bounce back from unexpected disruptions, such as natural disasters, cyber-attacks or hardware failures. 

Without a disaster recovery plan, major disruptions like these can result in extended power outages, data corruption, and the loss of critical information, severely impacting your business’s operations and damaging its reputation.

The main goal of a disaster recovery plan is to get your critical IT systems and data up and running as quickly as possible, minimising downtime and keeping your operations on track. 

With a well-thought-out disaster recovery plan, you’re not just preparing for worst-case scenarios. You’re also reducing the risk of severe disruptions, safeguarding your valuable data, and ensuring that your business can keep going strong, no matter what challenges come your way.

How to build a disaster recovery plan

Ready to learn how to build a disaster recovery plan? Here’s a step-by-step guide to get you started:

1. Identify your critical systems and data 

Start your disaster recovery plan by figuring out which of your IT systems, applications and data are most essential for your business operations. This will help you prioritise what needs to be recovered first in the event of a disruption. Here’s how this might look:

  • Inventory your IT assets: This includes hardware, software, applications and data storage systems, with a close consideration of details like the type of system, its location and its role within your business.
  • Identify the most important systems: When determining this, think about which systems, if suddenly unavailable, would cause the biggest disruption to your business. For example, systems that support customer transactions, financial processing or communication are often among the highest priority. 
  • List your data by importance: For this, you could list the most to least important data, including different types like operational data, legal data and strategic data.

2. Set recovery objectives

Next, define your Recovery Time Objectives (RTO) and Recovery Point Objectives (RPO). RTO is the maximum amount of downtime you can tolerate, while RPO is the maximum amount of data you can afford to lose.

To set an RTO, assess how long your systems can be down before it negatively affects your business. Knowing this can help you determine how quickly you need to restore operations to avoid significant impacts.

To set your RPO, assess how much data loss is acceptable, considering backup frequency and the importance of the data. You can measure this in terms of time, referring to the age of the data at the point of recovery. For instance, if your RPO is 4 hours, you are prepared to lose up to 4 hours of data.

3. Create recovery procedures

Create detailed instructions for restoring IT systems and data following a disruption. Here’s how you can approach this:

  • Develop step-by-step instructions: Outline clear instructions for each recovery task to make sure nothing is overlooked. For instance, if restoring a database, include steps for restoring backups, verifying data integrity, and reconfiguring system settings.
  • Define responsibilities: Define who is responsible for each aspect of the recovery process, from which team members are involved in managing backup systems, to who’s responsible for executing recovery steps.
  • List technical details: Detail the technical aspects of recovery, such as specific software tools or commands needed to restore systems.
  • Establish communication protocols: This involves outlining how communication will be managed throughout the recovery process, from how you’ll notify internal teams to how you’ll update customers and vendors.

4. Regularly test and update your plan

Testing and updating your plan is an excellent way to maintain the effectiveness of your disaster recovery strategy. This can involve running simulations and drills that mimic real-life scenarios, such as system outages, cyber-attacks or data breaches. 

Throughout this, keep a detailed record of any updates or changes. This can help you keep track of the development of your disaster recovery strategy and provide you with a helpful reference for future revisions.

What are the benefits of a disaster recovery plan?

A disaster recovery plan is crucial for keeping your business running smoothly when unexpected events strike. Let’s take a close look at some key benefits you can expect:

  • Minimised Downtime: A solid disaster recovery plan gets your IT systems and operations back up quickly. This reduces downtime and keeps your business running smoothly with minimal interruptions.
  • Data Protection: Protects your business from data loss by making sure critical data is backed up and recoverable.
  • Improved Compliance: Helps you meet industry regulations for data protection and business continuity, avoiding potential legal and financial penalties.
  • Enhanced Confidence: Having a robust plan in place shows clients, stakeholders and partners that you’re prepared for unexpected events. This helps build trust in your ability to handle disruptions effectively.
  • Reduced Financial Impact: By minimising downtime and protecting data, a disaster recovery plan cuts down on lost revenue and recovery costs, reducing the financial impact of disruptions.
  • Streamlined Recovery Process: With a disaster recovery plan, you’ll have clear, structured procedures for handling disruptions, making it easier for your team to respond efficiently and organise recovery efforts.
  • Increased Resilience: Regular testing and updates to your plan improve your organisation’s resilience, helping you adapt and respond to challenges.

Protect your business with Inspired IT

At Inspired IT, we pride ourselves on providing exceptional IT support and getting your business back on track when an IT emergency hits. 

We ensure your business quickly recovers from disasters with secure email and communication protection, regular data backups and a streamlined, process-driven recovery plan for any threat, compromise or data breach.

Disasters can strike when we least expect them, so don’t leave your recovery to chance. Contact Inspired IT for comprehensive disaster recovery services that will protect your business and keep it running smoothly, no matter what disaster comes your way.