According to a recent survey, small and mid-sized North American businesses are woefully unprepared for disasters and misled by existing data backup plans.

The 2009 Disaster Recovery & Business Continuity Survey was conducted by Agility Recovery Solutions and Hughes Marketing Group. More than 700 business owners and executives throughout North America participated.

Among the highlights were:

Data backup brings a false sense of security:

* 94 percent of companies have formal data backup plans.
* While 75 percent of companies say they can have their employees back to work within days of a disaster, only:
- 28 percent have access to alternative office space.
- 41 percent have access to mobile office space.
- 54 percent could acquire temporary office equipment.
- 57 percent have access to power generators.

Small and medium-sized businesses are ‘woefully unprepared for disasters’:

* 90 percent of smaller companies (<100 employees) surveyed spend less than one day per month maintaining their business continuity plans.

* One in five (22 percent) spend no time maintaining their plans.

* Comparatively, 20 percent of larger companies (>100 employees) spend more than 10 days per month on their business continuity plans.

Gaining C-level buy-in is a challenge:

Regardless of business size, survey results show many companies have difficulties getting C-level executives to embrace the importance of continuity planning.

Although 67 percent of respondents feel an effective business continuity plan is paramount to company success, only 53 percent think their company’s management team feels the same way.

Complete survey results are available at http://www2.agilityrecovery.com/assets/survey/2009survey.html

•Date:2nd June 2009• Region: N.America •Type: Article •Topic: BC statistics
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