Dear CEOs and industry leaders everywhere
Dear CEOs and industry leaders everywhere,
It’s the BC & Resilience industry here. How are you and your staff doing in these troubled times?
…Oh, I see. Glad to hear you’ve survived. We’re ok, thanks for asking! Actually, we’ve been reminiscing about the good old days of BC (Before Covid).
Remember those clichés we used to trot out at our meetings – ‘Plan for the worst, hope for the best’ – all that. Well, it happened – the biggie. We could say ‘I told you so’ and be smug, but actually if we’re honest this has been even worse than we BC professionals expected. Mainly because the impact of a pandemic was always going to be unpredictable, nature being a law unto itself.
Incidentally, you may have realised by now – Business Continuity and resilience is never an ‘out of the box’ template. Agility and flexibility is the name of the game – expecting the unexpected. (another one of those nice sayings we used to come out with!)
What about your IT systems and network - how’s it holding up so far since you had to rush out remote working? Hope you remembered to address those cyber security vulnerabilities we told you about – those holes so big you could drive a bus through them!*
So how did we do in helping you prepare for this? Did your incident team spring into action? What about the plans and impact analyses we spent hours drawing up – did you even read them, and if you did, were they helpful? Are your customers and stakeholders happy with your service or product? (assuming your supply chain hasn’t collapsed and you still have a business!) Sock it to us on the chin – we know we’re not perfect, so we’d rather know the truth.
But we’re hopeful (& cautiously confident) that our hard work payed off – and goodness knows we tried our best to get it right. Assuming that’s the case, we hope you are reflecting on those hours spent planning, and think that even though the last few months haven’t been easy it was time well spent. But no incident response is perfect (‘every plan fails first contact with the enemy’ etc…), and we’re happy to hear your thoughts. There was never a better time to be honest about lessons, and remember – no one is ‘to blame’. We in Business Continuity and Resilience don’t do ‘blame’, we only do ‘learn’.
Whilst reflecting, have you thought about the hero’s in your business who brought the plans to life. Who were they? We hope you are going to find a way of recognising them. Maybe your Business Continuity Manager is one of them?... but we won’t be offended if not. We know that incident response is about teamwork, not egos.
So, what of the future. Are you taking the opportunity to be radical and rethink your business strategy? There has never been a better time to think outside the box. Don’t be afraid as the brave new world emerges, but make sure your organisation is learning the lessons about ‘resilience by design’, so it can withstand the next shock. And believe us, there will be another one. We’re just not sure when.
*Talking of which, remember those cyber security vulnerabilities? May be someone has already driven that bus through them – you just haven’t found out yet.
Take good care. You know where we are when you need us – and we’re pretty sure you will at some point!
Love the BC and Resilience Professionals.
Author:
Julie Goddard – Databarracks and Humanex Resilience.
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