Is your Disaster Recovery plan up to date?
This is one area that many companies are guilty of understating in their annual budgets having undertaken superficial risk assessment then guesstimating the $ cost then off setting that risk to chance.

It may be so that when trying to secure a $ budget based around a number of fictitious scenarios, even the most persuasive IT managers may have trouble convincing the Director and the board that this an essential requirement, and year on year with no disaster occurring it gets harder and harder to retain that budget.

But the simple fact of the matter is that 90% without a solid and practicable DR, will not survive that event and will no longer be in existence in the following 12 months.

The range of potential risks to your business through IT outrage is hard to begin to calculate. For a small business, the cost a having complete and resilient fail-over solution many well exceed that companies entire annual income.
Insurance used to be a method to off- set the risk but the slow response of most insurers and their built in limit of liability may yield a payout to cover costs, but may well not allow the company to rebuilt and continue. Additionally insurance costs continue to spiral upwards due to global influences which apparently have little to do with your company on a local level.

So ignoring DR requirements seem like a tempting offer, but I it is your responsibility to show that you have taken step to provide due care and due diligence to the company, share holders, employees and partners.

So you must come up with a solution that does not require a director to give up his performance bonus but is tangible and executable.

In the next few weeks I will be suggesting DR solutions for your small to medium sized business that will assist you in formulating a solid DR plan that will not waste money and is presentable to your superiors and that you can use to protect you company.

Charles