Business Continuity and Resilience Blog

"I was recently tasked with writing a business continuity plan for a manufacturing organisation with critical production facilities close to a conflict zone.  This prompted me to write a paper about geopolitical resilience.  The organisation’s executive was positioning it for investment and wanted to be seen to be managing that aspect of risk.  They recognised the situation, the way investors might regard it and the potential need to resume in a planned, acceptable way if disruption occurred.  The focus was strongly on geopolitical risks whilst still planning for conventional natural perils. "

ISO 22301 proposes that organisations adopt the PDCA (Plan-Do-Check-Act) Model, a form of closed-loop control system.  This is recognised by Deming as the fundamental core of most management systems, which themselves have the effect of ‘breathing life’ into otherwise one-shot business initiatives.  Compare the benefit of writing a one-off continuity plan that quickly becomes obsolete and useless, with one that is kept up-to-date and continually improved. 

Over the last few years, many organisations have ‘upgraded’ their Business Continuity Manager roles to Resilience Manager positions. However, it’s not clear whether the function or the expertise required to support it have actually changed. Has one term simply been used to replace the other, and if it has, is vital nuance being lost?

Over the past 18 months, Inoni has been engaged in a project to help Associated British Ports (ABP) create business continuity plans, improving their resilience and ability to deal with emergency situations.

The Capability Maturity Model is a model for improving organisational processes such as software development, and has practical applications for business continuity management and organisational resilience.