Catastrophic events such as fire, flood and theft are rare, although the effect is often devastating and frequently leads to business failure. However, it is the more mundane events, such as server failure and cable damage, that cause significant business problems.
Even if small businesses have devised disaster recovery strategies to mitigate against the perceived level of business risk, they have typically failed to take into account the full complexity of an IT environment.
Yet most small companies, when considering the IT element of business continuity planning, think only of securing the data and fail to comprehend the importance of creating a strategy that also encompasses the equipment and its configuration.
As a result, even with a valid data back-up tape, a business may have to survive for 24-72 hours without access to key corporate information due to server failure. Those working in a supply chain often have to meet retailer-driven, just-in-time ordering systems that demand 24/7 availability. Losing the server that manages online customer orders may not just have a short-term impact on business productivity but may potentially result in the loss of long-term contracts.
Small businesses typically have limited IT resources. But to maximise those resources it is essential to understand and consider the real risks faced by each business. While most organisations happily invest in improving the data backup and storage capability, for example, it is rare to find a small firm with a second internet connection to provide resilience.
As these organisations come under increasing pressure from customers and business partners to demonstrate valid business resilience strategies, there is a need to understand not just the value of working technology but how best to ensure it stays working and available.
A data-only back-up strategy is ineffective and will fail to address the key elements of IT capability required to meet emerging requirements for business resilience: data, equipment and configuration.
A robust back-up solution - from offsite tape storage to online backup service - may ensure the business has a copy of the latest customer order information but if the server holding that data needs to be rebuilt, it will take a considerable time for the capability to be re-established.
Can the business really afford to wait that long for the IT team - assuming they have the expertise - to acquire and configure a new system? How long will it take a supplier to source and deliver the right equipment? How specialist was that piece of equipment?
Furthermore, the ability to rapidly rebuild that configuration will depend on whether or not the company has kept configuration documentation up to date; a business requirement often overlooked in some organisations. Without that information, small firms may struggle to recreate the exact system configuration necessary to support specific business needs, potentially further compromising operational performance.
Rebuilding an IT infrastructure in the event of disaster or even business interruption using this approach is far from straightforward and all the while customers and suppliers are losing patience, and faith, in the business.
The good news is that many organisations are already investing in virtualisation technology as part of the natural cycle of replacement. Today, every new server deployed by a small business is able to take advantage of the latest virtualisation technology which separates the underlying physical hardware from the software and systems and enables far more efficient and cost-effective use of the entire technology infrastructure.
Moving to virtualisation allows the configuration element to be thought of as data and removes the tight dependency between hardware and configuration. This virtual environment therefore provides a significant business resilience advantage by enabling the whole server to be copied from one machine to another with no need for configuration documentation. Speed of movement in the event of failure is therefore extremely fast.
As a direct result virtualisation technology enables organisations to gain the benefits of improved resilience, reduced configuration costs and allows it to take advantage of innovative server replication technologies. This software automatically replicates a snapshot of the server in real-time, either to an alternate site for "full site resilience" or to another server on the same site for "real-time failover", or even both. Taking this approach, organisations can attain a level of business continuity that was previously the preserve of large organisations yet at a fraction of the cost.
Leveraging virtual technology and server replication in this way completely transforms IT business continuity planning and procedures. There is no need to have IT staff on hand with the skill and knowledge required to rebuild servers, or to spend time and money ensuring documentation is always up to date, because the server is continuously being replicated.
It also greatly reduces the amount of regular testing advised by business continuity experts to ensure that, in the event of a disaster, the plan actually works and staff understand the procedure. With real-time replication, the organisation can see that corporate data and equipment configuration is being constantly copied and securely stored, reducing the need for expensive and resource intensive testing.
For entrepreneurial companies, investment in business resilience has to date been a grudge purchase that many have eschewed or has been addressed only when following a major failure. But in today's highly integrated economy with tightly linked supply chains, organisations face increasing pressure to demonstrate the quality of their business resilience and continuity planning to win new customers and ensure resilience throughout the supply chain.
Traditional complacent attitudes to business continuity are going to have to change. Regular data back-ups are not enough. If a small investment in real-time replication can deliver full failover and support innovative disaster recovery solutions, how can any small business continue to regard a day-long outage as acceptable?
Giles Sirett is chief executive of Octavia Information Systems. For more information visit www.octaviais.co.uk
