UPDATED Business Continuity Awareness Week confusion looms

The Business Continuity Institute has announced that its North American forums will be promoting Business Continuity Awareness Week between 18th to 24th September, to fall within the expected dates for the US’s National Preparedness Month.

The BCI says that the dates for the rest of the world will remain as 13th to 18th March.

While it makes sense to coordinate the Awareness Week with National Preparedness Month, the announcement threatens to create confusion in the market, especially since the BCI’s main competitor organisation, the Disaster Recovery Institute, has been promoting US Business Continuity Awareness Week as taking place between 13th and 18th March in line with other countries.

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READER COMMENTS:

Changing the date to meet a new US only initiative was a bad idea. Democratically the world has already chosen March. Historically the date has been in March. September was National Preparedness month - not BCA week.

- and who knows what date the new Homeland Security director is going to pick this year - if at all. Keep communications consistent. Join the world. Keep BCAW in March.

If National Preparedness month continues this September, then we have a second opportunity to communicate. Conversely, we/you/all can recommend to the NP Month co-chairs (Senators Susan Collins (R-ME) and Joseph Lieberman (D-CT) and Representatives Christopher Cox (R-CA) and Jane Harman (D-CA)) to consider joining the rest of the world in March. Which by the way is a much better time considering Tornado season for most of the US starts in the spring, and March is before - not in the middle of Hurricane Season. Preparedness starts before the crisis, which is what we are about. So lets keep the date in beginning of the year, March 13th-18th.

Jerry VanderWier, CBCP
Citibank - North American Cards, Business Continuity Management American Red Cross, Regional Disaster Shelter Coordinator

The decision to change BCAW from March to September in North America was taken as a result of a BCI initiative. A BCI representative in Canada assembled the following group of stakeholders:

* BCI
* DRII
* DRI Canada
* ACP
* Disaster Recovery Information Exchange
* Canadian Centre for Emergency Preparedness

This group made a decision to change the date in the United States and Canada to coincide with the US National Preparedness Month in September, recognising that the rest of the world would stay with March 13th-18th. Members of this committee were in unanimous agreement that the September dates were more appropriate for this and subsequent years.

The Disaster Recovery Institute began initially promoting the March dates for BCAW upon advice from BCI that these were the official dates.

Brian Miller CBCP, President, DRI Canada

It is absolutely ridiculous to have two BC Awareness Weeks. This is only going to create more confusion as the DRII is now promoting September 18-24 as GLOBAL BC Awareness Week.

While I'm working at a US based company, I previously had global responsibilities. What are they supposed to do? Hold this twice? I think this lack of coordination will be extremely BAD publicity for our industry.

Debra Zoppy, CBCP
Head of Business Continuity
The Guardian Life Insurance Company of America

Why not have two weeks a year globally with different levels of focus? These weeks appear to be exactly six months apart and given the subject matter it may not hurt to have booster shots. For example in the US the major drive can be in September with reminders sent out in March. The reverse would occur elsewhere in the world - with the major drive being in March and reminders in September. It may be useful to use each other’s material. Why not keep business continuity preparedness front and center at least twice a year after all we practice our fire drills twice a year.

ND, New York

What are multi-national companies supposed to do? The result will be no mention of Business Continuity Awareness week in any of our efforts to promote business continuity internally.
PV, UK multi-national

The word that jumps off the page in this discussion of how BCI chose to change their US observance of Business Continuity Awareness week from March to September is "competitor." In the starkest sense, yes, these two non-profit organizations vie for certificants' fees, but a larger matter is at issue: these two bodies operate within the market context of a profession, not an industry.

Business continuity planners are in a PROFESSIONAL practice, either as an external consultant or as an internal practitioner. Their employers or clients are either consultancies, or corporate or governmental bodies, which are "industries" per se. But they are serving the interests of our profession by offering training and certification. (Yes, full time consultants' employers benefit from certified talent in their ranks, because it aids marketing, but that is a derived result, since the individual, not the firm earns and retains the certificate.)

It is simply beyond understanding why BCI would choose to take such an action in a way that undermines the objective of the event: increase awareness of the profession they serve. This is a regrettable development that adversely impacts all practitioners, especially if the intent was simply to spite a so-called competitor. In this era of unprecedented globalization, a global perspective means working cooperatively across borders and organizational boundaries. That's what’s needed here.

Gregg Jacobsen

•Date: 28th January 2005 • Region: Various •Type: Article •Topic: BC general
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UPDATED 1ST FEBRUARY