Published on September 05, 2018
Business Continuity Management (BCM) is a key business strategy which proactively prepares organisations and their staff to cope, should the worst happen. The “worst-case scenario” can vary from enterprise to enterprise, but the Business Continuity lifecycle allows organisations to identify threats, analyse impacts to business operations and provides a framework for building organisational resilience with the capability for an effective response.
Contrary to popular belief, BCM is not just about ‘having a plan’. It is about organisations establishing, maintaining and improving an effective, iterative system which allows them to respond effectively, should disaster strike. It has the ability to safeguard the interests of an organisations key stakeholders, reputation, brand and value-creating activities.
The Business Continuity Management System (BCMS) is the part of the overall management system that establishes, implements, operates, monitors, reviews, maintains and improves Business Continuity. ISO 22301 describes an effective Business Continuity Management System as emphasizing the importance of:
If you were to ask most operational managers, ‘what is BCM all about?’, they will usually reply, ‘it is about what we do if the building is destroyed’.
However, most BCM professionals see this as too narrow a scope.
BCM is much wider, it is about examining operational, financial and reputational impacts, as well as physical risks. In addition to those already mentions, it has now grown to encompass a range of risks such as: