Most organizations have migrated all or some of their operations to the cloud to increase efficiencies, lower costs, and get a better business continuity architecture in the bargain. However, getting complacent and feeling safe can lead to disaster. A full BC plan audit is still necessary to guarantee that your organization’s BC plan components are synchronized and in full compliance with the latest technologies available. 

The first question is whether the audit should be conducted solely by in-house personnel or to bring in an outside specialist. Why not use both? A physician threatened with a serious personal medical situation would not hesitate to seek the opinion of a specialist. The life and health of your company is constantly at risk due to the numerous business threats of all types surfacing daily. This is particularly true of cyber-threats, and cyber-security is a specialty in itself. Therefore, even if your company has a designated security team in place, an outside specialist is strongly recommended. 

Another key factor to consider is that professional consulting organizations will tell you that the most cost-effective use of their services is with individuals or organizations that are knowledgeable with the area under discussion. Knowledgeable clients are much easier to work with because they initiate the process with a clear idea of what they require. The initial exploratory Q&A is dramatically shortened or eliminated if the audit directive is detailed. Organizations without BC staff will have a slightly longer path to follow but even that can be shortened with a little research to familiarize themselves with the subject matter.

The best place to start your research is tmcnet.com.  The site has a plethora of information covering a wide range of topics, and you can also sign up for magazine subscriptions, eNewsletters, news alerts and custom RSS feeds. The eNewsletters cover more than 100 topics so you can select just the ones that fit your requirements and modify the list as necessary. This may sound like the authors of this column are being self-serving but, frankly, TMC (News - Alert) is one of the world’s primary educational resources in the communications and technology field and a valuable research tool.

You only have one chance to survive your first disaster – don’t blow it. 

Max Schroeder is vice president emeritus of FaxCore Inc. (www.faxcore.com ). Rich Tehrani (News - Alert) is the president and group editor-in-chief at TMC (www.tmcnet.com) and conference chairman of ITEXPO.