Develop the Plan
The business continuity plan specifies several important things:
• who is in charge when an incident occurs
• what to do
• who does it
The plan justifies making advance arrangements, such as acquiring redundant equipment, arranging for data backups, and stockpiling supplies, before the catastrophe. The plan also justifies advance training so that people know how they should react. In a catastrophe there will be confusion; you do not want to add confused people to the already severe problem.
The person in charge declares the state of emergency and instructs people to follow the procedures documented in the plan. The person in charge also declares when the emergency is over and conditions can revert to normal.
Seldom will the plan tell precise steps to take in a crisis, because the nature of crises is too varied. Even in broad categories (such as, something causes the network to fail) the nature of “failure” and the prospects for recovery (one hour, one day, one week) are so imprecise that no plan can dictate what to do in each situation. Instead, the person in charge has latitude to take action that seems best at the time. The point is, one person is in charge and is authorized to spend money necessary to recover at least partially.
