In our last blog we talked about how the advancements of cloud have altered the landscape and approach to disaster recovery. Today we will focus on an important piece of a complete DR strategy...The Disaster Recovery PLAN.
"Yes we have a Disaster Recovery Plan"
I hear this a lot. Truth is, "plan" means many different things to many different people. I think in most cases, it simply means, yes we have our data offsite and a place to spin it up if something bad happens. A true DR plan is much more than this. In a recent Evolve IP Survey involving 1,000 companies, 70% said they did not have a sufficient DR Plan in place.
What is a sufficient DR Plan?
The plan stems from part one in our series, the Business Impact Analysis. In order to draft a sufficient plan, it is vital to understand the impact of a disaster first. Having set Recovery Time Objectives (RTO) allows you to build a plan of action. The most important word in that last sentence is actually "draft". Many companies who say they have a plan in place can't actually produce the documented plan if prompted with that followon question. The big reason documenting the plan is so important, is that the authors and executors of the plan, may not be in a position to actually execute in the event of a disaster. Limiting a DR Plan to simply the key IT people in the company is a very limited approach. We will touch more on this in part 4 which is "Testing your Disaster Recovery Plan", but for now, just think about documenting, and making everyone aware of this plan.
Where do I start with my DR Plan?
Companies like ours can assist of course, but understanding your RTO, RPO and Compliance requirements is key. Veeam Availability Orchestrator is a great new tool that guides you through building a plan with templates.
These templates are built around various industries and compliance requirements. Included are nice C-Level documents which well help generate the awareness you require in order to deliver a sufficient DR Plan.
A key element to the plan that we have not touched on..."The Infrastructure" is vital to the plan. So now is good time to get into the infrastructure solutions for DR in the Cloud era. Join us for part 3 in the series next week to learn more.
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