The twin tower disaster, which occurred seven years ago, awakened the world to the importance of contingency plans. Some companies located at the WTC simply lost 100% of their business information. Even those who, spared from the fatality, saved their brains, found themselves facing the challenge of starting over without files and without any recorded reference of the past. Now, security and continuity occupy the minds of the CEOs. Not only the terrorist threats, which do not exist among Brazilians, but also natural catastrophes and possible disasters (fire, burglary, destruction of all types), which are ghosts that terrorize all managers.

We live in a world that is threatened by numerous incidents, which may be caused by economic, environmental, social and technological change, putting business in jeopardy. Besides the continuity of client service, everyone seeks for alternatives to ensure the integrity of their data and operations, especially the history of transactions made by their clients. This was the precise concern that stimulated the creation of the NBR 15999-1 norm for the Management of Business Continuity (MBC), stipulated by the Brazilian Association of Technical Norms (ABNT).

Based on an English version, the norm has the purpose of helping companies in the adoption of better MBC practices, providing guidance in the creation of incident response plans. It is a process that identifies potential threats and their possible impacts to operations. The MBC norms allow for the company to develop an organizational resistance, capable of responding effectively to challenges to the continuity of their business, which does not imply only its operation, but especially its reputation. The participation of top management is essential in order to guarantee that the MBC process is correctly introduced and established as part of the company’s culture.

Due to Brazilian Bank Federation (Febraban) requirements, all banks must implement means to guarantee the continuity of their business.

In order to do so, one of the most common technologies is the duplication of the main site, mirroring it on a backup site, which, in case of failure, takes over the continuity of the operation. However, this methodology is being replaced by more economically viable models, which use server virtualization technologies, creating quite efficient and cost efficient contingency environments.

The ideal adoption of an MBC must involve the person responsible for the intelligence within the organization, since he/she will need to make an inventory of the assets, people and technologies, make an impact analysis of the business, define the control strategies and design the continuity plans. It is worth emphasizing that the uncalculated risk and the sudden interruption of operations will fatally result in significant damage to the organization. Not to mention that the interruption of continuity of a financial institution compromises not only its performance, but also its image on the market and with its clients.

Now that the 9/11 lessons had been learned, the security in the major Brazilian banks is complete.  If their headquarters are ever destroyed, it is possible to have the institutions back online within a few hours, as if nothing had happened. But the major difficulty is that the preoccupation with the establishment of a business continuity plan is still restricted to large institutions. As their size is reduced, the systems lose efficiency and reliability.

Organizations that have no Plan B to protect their businesses run the serious risk of not recovering in case an incident occurs. A survey conducted by the Guardian IT affirms that, after an incident, 8% of the companies without a continuity plan do not reopen, 40% reopen but close within 18 months, 12% reopen but close within 5 years, and only 8% survive.

There is still a long way to go until everyone realizes that the capacity of maintaining its essential operations running or reestablishing them quickly is the difference between success and failure. Without doubt, the most successful organizations are those that always have a plan B.

GILBERTO CAPARICA

Marketing Director of Cimcorp

Article Published in the Gazeta Mercantil.