Is there any statistic that was ever so widely used and abused? It’s the one that says “80% of businesses affected by a major incident close within 18 months”, or any similar version. While it’s true that unplanned business disruption can cause financial losses and other prejudice (including bankruptcy), critics of the 80% statistic suggest there is little real data to support it. Read more
Smart business continuity managers, like other smart people, know that shamelessly applying good ideas to meet objectives is an efficient way of moving forwards, whether the good idea was theirs in the first place or somebody else’s. With this in mind, here are some interesting ideas from a discussion on the challenges of effective cybersecurity, which could equally well apply to the propagation of business continuity. Read more
Outsourcing and third party suppliers were highly fashionable a few years ago. Now the enthusiasm is somewhat tempered by a number of realisations. Increased risk and in some cases outright failure have incited enterprises to take a closer look at third party impacts on business continuity. Recent figures from auditing and consulting company Deloitte in the UK state that 87% of organisations surveyed have suffered business disruption due to third parties, whether from loss of data, failure to deliver on time, or other causes. Confidence in managing third party risk was low to moderate for over 94%, yet over 73% thought third parties would be critical to their business in the coming year. So how big are the risks and what are the solutions? Read more