Business continuity trends and challenges 2019: interim survey results
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- Published: Wednesday, 19 December 2018 08:11
For the past five years Continuity Central has conducted an online survey asking business continuity professionals about their expectations for the year ahead. We are repeating the survey again this year and the interim results are now available. They are as follows...
Initial demographics
So far, the majority of respondents (76.5 percent) are from business continuity professionals operating in large organizations. 9.5 percent are from medium sized and 14 percent are from small sized organizations. The top responding country so far is the United States, where 39 percent of respondents are located; followed by the UK (22.5 percent) and Australia (6 percent).
Interim results
The interim results from each question are as follows:
What level of changes do you expect to see in the way your organization manages business continuity during 2019?
Respondents so far indicate that the majority (59 percent) of business continuity professionals expect only to see relatively small changes to the way their organization manages business continuity during 2019. However, a significant 33.33 percent of respondents are anticipating large changes. The final survey results will provide a breakdown of the actual changes that respondents are expecting and an analysis of the trends in this area.
What is the biggest change you expect to see in business continuity practices or strategies within your organization during 2019?
The top trends so far in this area are:
- 24.5 percent will be making major revisions to BCM strategies and/or business continuity plans;
- 11 percent of respondents expect their organization to implement new business continuity software during 2019;
- 9 percent expect their organization to conduct more business continuity tests and exercises during 2019
- 9 percent will be making significant changes to their crisis management capabilities;
- 8 percent will be giving more attention to managing cyber security and cyber risks;
- 8 percent will be making a major revision to IT DR or ICT continuity strategies;
- 5 percent say that there will be a move towards enterprise wide resilience, organizational or operational resilience.
What is the biggest challenge that may hold back business continuity developments within your organization during 2018?
Three major themes have emerged so far. These are
- Lack of budget and resources: 50 percent of respondents so far state that this is a key challenge. Of these, 55 percent said that lack of budget will be their main challenge in 2018, while 45 percent said that their top problem will be lack of resources.
- Lack of commitment, buy-in and support across the organization: 17 percent
- Lack of organizational commitment, buy-in and support from top management: 15 percent
Other recurring themes include:
- Competing priorities within the organization: 9 percent;
- Organizational changes: 8 percent;
- Brexit: 6 percent.
Business continuity spending
Respondents were asked to indicate how business continuity spending in their organization will change in 2019. So far, the results are:
- Spending will be much higher in 2019 compared to 2018: 7 percent
- Spending will be higher in 2019 compared to 2018: 31 percent
- 2019 spending will be the same as 2018: 53 percent
- 2019 spending will be lower than 2018: 7.5 percent
- 2019 spending will be much lower than 2018: 1.5 percent.
Business continuity recruitment
Respondents were asked how the size of the business continuity team in their organization will change in 2019. So far, the results are:
- Grow (we will recruit new team members): 28 percent
- Stay the same: 66 percent
- Shrink (we will reduce the number of team members): 6 percent.
Take part
The survey will remain open until the end of December and we invite all business continuity professionals to take part at https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/BCin2019 Your participation would be much appreciated!
