|
A short comment by Andrew Sinclair.
As more sectors of the economy begin to appreciate, or become driven to appreciate, the value of having a robust contingency plan, isn’t it time we looked at making it easy for them? The business continuity industry has grown up over the past ten years or so to have its own idiosyncratic acronyms and jargon. Although practitioners are comfortable discussing RPOs and RTOs, BIAs, MTDs and WARFs, are we erecting barriers which make it harder for the non-practitioner to understand what we’re talking about?
It’s been well documented that selling business continuity (another bit of jargon!) to the board and senior executives in any organisation can be an uphill task. Is this because we hide behind our own language? The value of what we deliver becomes clear to those who engage – but only after the delivery. Too often, we create a fog which must be off-putting for many.
So what can we do about this? For a start we can all accept that we should be using language our clients will more readily understand. How about talking about ‘keeping things going’ instead of ‘business continuity’? Or perhaps ‘what to do next’ instead of recovery planning. After all, much of what we do is quite simply structured common sense. It’s true that the larger the organisation, the harder it can be to capture the common sense within it, but once captured it’s easy to write it down. Even the basic notion of writing down what you should do in the event of something going wrong is common sense.
As a consultancy firm, Glen Abbot is as good, or perhaps as bad, as the rest of the industry in hiding behind our language. Yet the first thing we do in our training courses is explain the jargon! While it’s attractive as a profession to maintain the mystique of what we do, doing this won’t help us expand the market and improve resilience.
I’m reminded of the words on the cover of the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy – ‘Don’t Panic’. Maybe that’s what we should all be promoting!
Andrew Sinclair
Commercial Director
Glen Abbot
Make a comment
I am all for making business continuity easier to understand. My question is who will understand?
If you mean the BC consultant who can't stay on message and does not really understand the difference between contingency and continuity? That will take a lot of retraining.
If you mean the CXX, who is to understand what is trying to be sold to them? Then there might be a problem with the packaging.
If you mean the vast majority of people who are employed throughout the world to continue business? You might have the correct audience.
The communications of continuity is NOT about what the professionals have to tell the businesses. It is about them communicating clearly to themselves about what they do, how they do it and when they do it. They communicate for one reason to continue their business every day.
Philip Oppenheim, CBCP
From my extensive experience in government, in the area of setting of protective security standards, there are three key issues when addressing the subject of BCP. They are:
* CEO's need to understand that it is best practice to have a BCP or the subsequent consequences of not having such.
* CE0's understanding of the impact of closures or part closure of an enterprise and responsibilities regarding deliverables, either to other stakeholders or shareholders;
* CEO's must be shown the financial ramifications of not having a BCP.
Without the CEO or Board being consulted in the first place it is most difficult to introduce the subject of Business Continuity Planning and the need for such.
Michael Roach
We have recently discussed this in our business, for whom I am a senior BC advisor. Although I write this as an individual, and my views may not be shared by my business it transpires that each global region has its own acronyms, pet phrases, buzz words, naming conventions (Division = group = line of business = etc.). Also and far more worryingly, is the trend to escalate each 'new' potential threat to immense proportions and then worry about how much individual reporting needs to be done about each one - fire plan, earthquake plan, power outage plan, pandemic plan, explosion plan, etc. etc. etc.
Whatever happened to making things simple? Loss of structure, infrastructure, key personnel or multiple personnel still covers the vast majority of scenarios and simplifies reporting, exercising and maintenance requirements. Of course, life safety plans are the most important and must be in place. But these are primarily emergency plans to get people to safety.
True, A 'loss of multiple personnel' plan will not have the detail required for a specific threat such as pandemic ‘flu, or SARS - but I would argue that the unique elements of a pandemic ‘flu plan (employee education, workforce management, social distancing, PPE, infection control, isolation practices and third party issues should form a series of appendices (or even just 1, the pandemic ‘flu appendix). As far as operational recovery is concerned surely the remaining team will still have to carry out the same critical functions (using the same tools and resources) regardless of whether the dread lurgy, or a dirty bomb, was the trigger?
I fully appreciate this is a simple viewpoint - but what better place to start, how better to get people to understand that a simple plan is often the best plan and that NO plan ever survives contact with the enemy.
Shaun Deely
The author’s point is well taken – especially in regard to talking to business management about this topic. And this is no different than broaching any other technical topic to business. However, within our profession, the jargon is about much more than, ‘maintain(ing) the mystique of what we do.’ As with all professions, the jargon serves to form a common set of definitions as part of a drive towards standards and best practices. And outside of the profession, it serves a similar function for auditors and for business managers too when issues of compliance rise. To describe a state of readiness we need standards and metrics – all pointing back to specific terms (jargon). Like any tool, jargon can be misused. And like any tool, the right tool for the job can bring success. Perhaps this is the art of business continuity, and perhaps as your comment seems to suggest, mastery of this art is what will separate the true professionals from the hacks.
I would advise initiating the continuity conversation with common sense, non-technical terms, but over time introducing these terms into the conversation as needed and as appropriate for clarity and mutual understanding.
Dan Dorman
•Date: 1st June 2007• Region: UK/World •Type: Article •Topic: BC general
Rate this article or make a comment - click here
UPDATED 6TH JUNE
|
