|
Thursday 2nd October 2003 was unusually bright and
sunny. Overlooking the Millennium Bridge, the Baltic Flour Mills
and the river Tyne from the prestigious Quayside offices of Ward
Hadaway -one of the UK's top 100 law firms - James Royds of InfoSec
Associates was warmly welcomed by Peter Allan the Chairman of the
North East branch of the Institute of Directors, to address breakfast
delegates on the importance of Business Continuity in the Region.
Among the delegates present were Bryan Rees, Director Regional
Intelligence and Resilience for Government Office North East; and
Maitland Hyslop representing One NorthEast. Both are actively involved
in promoting the virtues of the North East as a UK centre for regional
resilience.
James highlighted the reasons for developing a business continuity
plan, outlining all the important steps in the process; and explained
many of the current themes, issues and business drivers which underpin
best practice. For example, he carefully explained the difference
between business continuity, disaster recovery and information security
and what effect your planning has on your ability to recover if
you do not have a well trained incident management team.
When asked why it was necessary to have a robust plan in place,
James replied: "because the loss, denial or unavailability
for more than a few hours of any critical business process, information
or operational capability can have a significant impact on your
business. In worst cases threatening its very survival. Information
and incident management training are the keys to survival".
James went on to explain that Business Continuity Management is
a proven strategic risk management discipline designed to help organisations
- large, medium and small - to mitigate against and overcome business
interruptions however and whenever they arise. The aim of Business
Continuity Planning, he said: "is to ensure that organisations
are capable of planning for, responding to, coping with and recovering
from disruptions to "normal" operations".
His vital message was the integration of Business Continuity Planning
with Information Security into a single risk management discipline:
"the key resilience indicator of any credible corporate governance
programme today is an integrated business continuity and information
security management system. Evidence of the two is not hard to find
while the lack of either is a high risk and increasingly vulnerable
strategy in today's digitally connected, holistic and litigious
corporate world".
end…
Contact:
InfoSec Associates
The Enterprise Centre
Mindrum
Northumberland
TD12 4QN
WWW.infosec-associates.com
info@infosec-associates.com
|
