Business continuity planning -- how to carry on operating even after a disaster -- is still often thought of an expensive exercise only affordable to large corporates.
So says Warren Olivier, regional manager for southern Africa at Veeam Software, who believes that in this era of the always-on business, failing to do this planning is irresponsible.
Olivier says business continuity planning is now easier than before, and affordable for most companies.
He points out technology has allowed hardware to be pushed further so more can be done with less. "Also, the flexibility that virtualisation brings allows for easy data movement and advances in storage management has reduced the amount of data that needs to be transmitted," he says.
"A company could also look at what applications are more critical than others and consider tiering options for disaster recovery. For example, higher cost for mission-critical apps, but there are fewer of them, say 10%, then lower costs for less important applications and so on - disaster recovery tiering."
He says the tools available in the virtualised modern data centre can automate much of the process of recovering data after a disaster, whether it's due to natural causes like earthquakes, fires and floods, or human action like computer viruses and terrorist attacks.
"Business continuity planning starts with your backup and data protection policies," he continues. "What data and applications are most critical to your organisation? Where are they stored and how do you back them up? In the event of a disaster, who needs access and when, and where will you restore to?"
Olivier notes these business process questions are central, and especially for companies facing the growing demands for always-on availability.
"A good business continuity plan should include a 'runbook' or script that setting out exactly what needs to be done, by whom and in what order. For example, an Exchange server won't connect unless Active Directory is running, so you know you will need Active Directory before you can get your e-mail back."
Once the runbook is set up, says Olivier, much of the process can be automated so key staff members don't have to make important decisions in the heat and pressure of the moment.
"You'll always want to ensure the actual decision to fail over to your disaster recovery plan is made by an actual human, preferably a C-level executive, because once you've failed over it's difficult to rewind. But once the big red button is pushed, automation ? except at a few key points ? is extremely helpful."
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