Through a wealth of examples, diagrams, and real-world case studies, this groundbreaking book provides a streamlined, realistic methodology to change business continuity dramatically and shows you how you can execute it in your own organization. --

Have you begun to question traditional best practices in business continuity (BC)? Do you seem to be concentrating on documentation rather than preparedness? Compliance rather than recoverability? Do your efforts provide true business value? If you have these concerns, David Lindstedt and Mark Armour offer a solution in Adaptive Business Continuity: A New Approach. This ground-breaking new book provides a streamlined, realistic methodology to change BC dramatically. After years of working with the traditional practices of business continuity (BC) – in project management, higher education, contingency planning, and disaster recovery – David Lindstedt and Mark Armour identified unworkable areas in many core practices of traditional BC. To address these issues, they created nine Adaptive BC principles, the foundation of this book: Deliver continuous value. Document only for mnemonics. Engage at many levels within the organization. Exercise for improvement, not for testing. Learn the business. Measure and benchmark. Obtain incremental direction from leadership. Omit the risk assessment and business impact analysis. Prepare for effects, not causes. Adaptive Business Continuity: A New Approach uses the analogy of rebuilding a house. After the initial design, the first step is to identify and remove all the things not needed in the new house. Thus, the first chapter is “Demolition” – not to get rid of the entire BC enterprise, but to remove certain BC activities and products to provide the space to install something new. The stages continue through foundation, framework, and finishing. Finally, the last chapter is “Dwelling,” permitting you a glimpse of what it might be like to live in this new home that has been created. Through a wealth of examples, diagrams, and real-world case studies, Lindstedt and Armour show you how you can execute the Adaptive BC framework in your own organization. You will: Recognize specific practices in traditional BC that may be problematic, outdated, or ineffective. Identify specific activities that you may wish to eliminate from your practice. Learn the capability and constraint model of recoverability. Understand how Adaptive BC can be effective in organizations with vastly different cultures and program maturity levels. See how to take the steps to implement Adaptive BC in your own organization. Think through some typical challenges and opportunities that may arise as you implement an Adaptive BC approach.

This easy workbook format shows managers new to Business Continuity Planning how to quickly develop a basic plan and keep it updated. If you've been tasked with developing a basic business continuity plan and aren't sure where to start, this workbook with sample forms, checklists, templates, and plans will walk you step-by-step through the process. The book is aimed at single/few location companies with up to 250 employees and is more oriented to an office environment, especially where computer operations are critical. It offers a fast, practical approach for small companies with limited staff and time to customize a workable plan and expand it as they grow. Endorsed by The Business Continuity Institute and Disaster Recovery Institute International, it includes these helpful tools: Straightforward, jargon-free explanations emphasize the non-technical aspects of Information Technology/Disaster Recovery planning. Glossary with 120 terms and Appendices with sample risk assessment and risk analysis checklists. Extensive, easy to-use downloadable resources include reproducible worksheets, forms, templates, questionnaires, and checklists for various natural disasters and special hazards such as power outages, boiler failures, bomb threats, hazardous material spills, and civil unrest, along with a checklist for vital records storage. For professional development or college classes the book is accompanied by a set of Instructor Materials.

Since the publication of the first edition in 2002, interest in crisis management has been fuelled by a number of events, including 9/11. The first edition of this text was praised for its rigorous yet logical approach, and this is continued in the second edition, which provides a well-researched, theoretically robust approach to the topic combined with empirical research in continuity management. New chapters are included on digital resilience and principles of risk management for business continuity. All chapters are revised and updated with particular attention being paid to the impact on smaller companies. New cases include: South Africa Bank, Lego, Morgan Stanley Dean Witter; small companies impacted by 9/11; and the New York City power outage of August 2003.

Business Continuity from Preparedness to Recovery: A Standards-Based Approach details the process for building organizational resiliency and managing Emergency and Business Continuity programs. With over 30 years of experience developing plans that have been tested by fire, floods, and earthquakes, Tucker shows readers how to avoid common traps and ensure a successful program, utilizing, detailed Business Impact Analysis (BIA) questions, continuity strategies and planning considerations for specific business functions. One of the few publications to describe the entire process of business continuity planning from emergency plan to recovery, Business Continuity from Preparedness to Recovery addresses the impact of the new ASIS, NFPA, and ISO standards. Introducing the important elements of business functions and showing how their operations are maintained throughout a crisis situation, it thoroughly describes the process of developing a mitigation, prevention, response, and continuity Management System according to the standards. Business Continuity from Preparedness to Recovery fully integrates Information Technology with other aspects of recovery and explores risk identification and assessment, project management, system analysis, and the functional reliance of most businesses and organizations in a business continuity and emergency management context. - Offers a holistic approach focusing on the development and management of Emergency and Business Continuity Management Systems according to the new standards - Helps ensure success by describing pitfalls to avoid and preventive measures to take - Addresses program development under the standards recently developed by ISO, ASIS and NFPA - Provides both foundational principles and specific practices derived from the author's long experience in this field - Explains the requirements of the Business Continuity Standards

A disruption to your critical business processes could leave the entire business exposed. Today's organizations face ever-escalating customer demands and expectations. There is no room for downtime. You need to provide your customers with continuous service because your customers have a lot of choices. Your competitors are standing ready to take your place. As you work hard to grow your business, you face the challenge of keeping your business running without a glitch. To remain competitive, you need a resilient IT infrastructure. This IBM Redbooks publication introduces the importance of Business Continuity in today's IT environments. It provides a comprehensive guide to planning for IT Business Continuity and can help you design and select an IT Business Continuity solution that is right for your business environment. We discuss the concepts, procedures, and solution selection for Business Continuity in detail, including the essential set of IT Business Continuity requirements that you need to identify a solution. We also present a rigorous Business Continuity Solution Selection Methodology that includes a sample Business Continuity workshop with step-by-step instructions in defining requirements. This book is meant as a central resource book for IT Business Continuity planning and design. The companion title to this book, IBM System Storage Business Continuity: Part 2 Solutions Guide, SG24-6548, describes detailed product solutions in the System Storage Resiliency Portfolio.

The fundamental theme of this book is theoretical study of differential evolution and algorithmic analysis of parameter adaptive schemes. The book offers real-world insights into a variety of large-scale complex industrial applications.

Powerful Earthquake Triggers Tsunami in Pacific. Hurricane Katrina Makes Landfall in the Gulf Coast. Avalanche Buries Highway in Denver. Tornado Touches Down in Georgia. These headlines not only have caught the attention of people around the world, they have had a significant effect on IT professionals as well. As technology continues to become more integral to corporate operations at every level of the organization, the job of IT has expanded to become almost all-encompassing. These days, it's difficult to find corners of a company that technology does not touch. As a result, the need to plan for potential disruptions to technology services has increased exponentially. That is what Business Continuity Planning (BCP) is: a methodology used to create a plan for how an organization will recover after a disaster of various types. It takes into account both security and corporate risk management tatics.There is a lot of movement around this initiative in the industry: the British Standards Institute is releasing a new standard for BCP this year. Trade shows are popping up covering the topic.* Complete coverage of the 3 categories of disaster: natural hazards, human-caused hazards, and accidental and technical hazards.* Only published source of information on the new BCI standards and government requirements.* Up dated information on recovery from cyber attacks, rioting, protests, product tampering, bombs, explosions, and terrorism.

You have the knowledge and skill to create a workable Business Continuity Management (BCM) program – but too often, your projects are stalled while you attempt to get the right information from the right person. Rachelle Loyear experienced these struggles for years before she successfully revamped and reinvented her company’s BCM program. In The Manager’s Guide to Simple, Strategic, Service-Oriented Business Continuity, she takes you through the practical steps to get your program back on track. Rachelle Loyear understands your situation well. Her challenge was to manage BCM in a large enterprise that required hundreds of BC plans to be created and updated. The frustrating reality she faced was that subject matter experts in various departments held the critical information she needed, but few were willing to write their parts of the plan. She tried and failed using all the usual methods to educate and motivate – and even threaten – departments to meet her deadlines. Finally, she decided there had to be a better way. The result was an incredibly successful BCM program that was adopted by BCM managers in other companies. She calls it “The Three S’s of BCM Success,” which can be summarized as: Simple – Strategic – Service-Oriented. Loyear’s approach is easy and intuitive, considering the BCM discipline from the point of view of the people in your organization who are tasked to work with you on building the plans and program. She found that most people prefer: Simple solutions when they are faced with something new and different. Strategic use of their time, making their efforts pay off. Service to be provided, lightening their part of the load while still meeting all the basic requirements. These tactics explain why the 3S program works. It helps you, it helps your program, and it helps your program partners. Loyear says, “If you follow the ‘Three S’ philosophy, the number of plans you need to document will be fewer, and the plans will be simpler and easier to produce. I’ve seen this method succeed repeatedly when the traditional method of handing a business leader a form to fill out or a piece of software to use has failed to produce quality plans in a timely manner.” In The Manager’s Guide to Simple, Strategic, Sevice-Oriented Business Continuity, Loyear shows you how to: Completely change your approach to the problems of “BCM buy-in.” Find new ways to engage and support your BCM program partners and subject matter experts. Develop easier-to-use policies, procedures, and plans. Improve your overall relationships with everyone involved in your BCM program. Craft a program that works around the roadblocks rather than running headlong into them.

This paper examines a case study following the development of business continuity plans at Portland State University (PSU). The PSU business continuity planning team explored a new theory of Adaptive Business Continuity and evaluated its usefulness in an academic service industry. The business continuity project team set out to answer these critical questions: ‘Could the Adaptive Business Continuity Theory work for PSU? Was it up to the challenge of many departments with varied regulations, rhythms and stakeholders? Could the Adaptive Business Continuity Theory be implemented by a limited emergency management staff? Would there be enough buy-in from the PSU department subject matter experts to produce a workable business continuity plan?’ The results supported the use of Adaptive Business Continuity Theory at PSU, with a wider range of benefits then expected.