Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery Planning for IT Professionals


Book Description

Powerful Earthquake Triggers Tsunami in Pacific. Hurricane Katrina Makes Landfall in the Gulf Coast. Avalanche Buries Highway in Denver. Tornado Touches Down in Georgia. These headlines not only have caught the attention of people around the world, they have had a significant effect on IT professionals as well. As technology continues to become more integral to corporate operations at every level of the organization, the job of IT has expanded to become almost all-encompassing. These days, it's difficult to find corners of a company that technology does not touch. As a result, the need to plan for potential disruptions to technology services has increased exponentially. That is what Business Continuity Planning (BCP) is: a methodology used to create a plan for how an organization will recover after a disaster of various types. It takes into account both security and corporate risk management tatics.There is a lot of movement around this initiative in the industry: the British Standards Institute is releasing a new standard for BCP this year. Trade shows are popping up covering the topic.* Complete coverage of the 3 categories of disaster: natural hazards, human-caused hazards, and accidental and technical hazards.* Only published source of information on the new BCI standards and government requirements.* Up dated information on recovery from cyber attacks, rioting, protests, product tampering, bombs, explosions, and terrorism.




Business Continuity


Book Description

The Business Continuity playbook provides the background and tools to create, manage, and execute all facets of an organization's business continuity program (BCP). Business continuity planning is an activity performed daily by organizations of all types and sizes to ensure that critical business functions are available before, during, and after a crisis. This playbook guides the security leader through the development, implementation, and maintenance of a successful BCP. The text begins with a detailed description of the concept and value of business continuity planning, transitioning into a step-by-step guide to building or enhancing a BCP. Its 14 appendices, which include sample forms, templates, and definitions, make it an invaluable resource for business continuity planning. The Business Continuity playbook is a part of Elsevier's Security Executive Council Risk Management Portfolio, a collection of real world solutions and "how-to" guidelines that equip executives, practitioners, and educators with proven information for successful security and risk management programs. - Answers the unavoidable question, "What is the business value of a business continuity program?" - Breaks down a business continuity program into four major elements for better understanding and easier implementation - Includes 14 appendices that provide sample forms, templates, and definitions for immediate adaptation in any business setting







Principles and Practice of Business Continuity


Book Description

This comprehensive how-to guide captures the distilled wisdom and experience of Jim Burtles, a founding fellow of the Business Continuity Institute; an internationally renowned figure in business continuity with over 30 years of experience and teaching across 22 countries; and a veteran of practical experience that includes recovery work with victims of events such as bombings, earthquakes, storms and fires, along with technical assistance/ support in more than 90 disasters, and advice/guidance for clients in over 200 emergency situations. As such, this book is a gold mine of practical information, based on solid theoretical underpinnings. It is an ideal combination of the practice of business continuity - standards, best practices, global perspectives - and, the process of business continuity - planning, development, implementation, and maintenance. Jim presents a clear picture of not only how to do what needs to be done, but why. By striking a balance between theory and practice, Jim's approach makes the reader's job much easier and more effective. Illustrated with numerous charts, forms and checklists, the book covers business continuity management from start to finish: understanding risks; assessing impact and developing a Business Impact Analysis; choosing contingency strategies; emergency response processes and procedures; salvage and restoration; disaster recovery; developing business continuity plans, including those for business continuity, emergency response, crisis management, function restoration, and disaster recovery; maintaining long term continuity; reviewing and auditing plans; exercising and testing plans; crisis management; dealing with various personnel issues before, during and after a crisis; and working with a variety of agencies and people, including local authorities, regulators, insurers, fire and rescue personnel, and neighbors. This comprehensive reference based on years of practical experience will ensure that the reader is in a position to engage in all of the activities associated with the development, delivery, exercise and maintenance of a business continuity program. There is a glossary of 90 business continuity terms. The accompanying downloadable BCP Tool Kit has 24 planning and analysis tools, including sample plans for evacuation, emergency response, and crisis management; scripts and plot development tools for creating exercises to test and audit plans; analysis tools for fire exposure, service impact, resource requirements, etc. It also includes checklists, case studies, and Web references. In addition to those highlighted above, this book includes additional important features: Ideal for senior undergraduate, MBA, certificate, and corporate training programs. Chapter overviews and conclusions; charts, graphs and checklists throughout Glossy of 90 business continuity terms. Downloadable Business Continuity Tool Kit, including templates of a sample business continuity plan, evacuation plan, emergency response plan, crisis management plan; case studies and exercises; student assignments; Websites; reader self-assessment. Instructor Materials, including PowerPoint slides, Syllabus and Instructor's Manual for 8-week course, with emphasis on student role playing. Author is a business continuity management pioneer and legend




Business Continuity from Preparedness to Recovery


Book Description

Business Continuity from Preparedness to Recovery: A Standards-Based Approach details the process for building organizational resiliency and managing Emergency and Business Continuity programs. With over 30 years of experience developing plans that have been tested by fire, floods, and earthquakes, Tucker shows readers how to avoid common traps and ensure a successful program, utilizing, detailed Business Impact Analysis (BIA) questions, continuity strategies and planning considerations for specific business functions. One of the few publications to describe the entire process of business continuity planning from emergency plan to recovery, Business Continuity from Preparedness to Recovery addresses the impact of the new ASIS, NFPA, and ISO standards. Introducing the important elements of business functions and showing how their operations are maintained throughout a crisis situation, it thoroughly describes the process of developing a mitigation, prevention, response, and continuity Management System according to the standards. Business Continuity from Preparedness to Recovery fully integrates Information Technology with other aspects of recovery and explores risk identification and assessment, project management, system analysis, and the functional reliance of most businesses and organizations in a business continuity and emergency management context. - Offers a holistic approach focusing on the development and management of Emergency and Business Continuity Management Systems according to the new standards - Helps ensure success by describing pitfalls to avoid and preventive measures to take - Addresses program development under the standards recently developed by ISO, ASIS and NFPA - Provides both foundational principles and specific practices derived from the author's long experience in this field - Explains the requirements of the Business Continuity Standards




The Architecture of Continuity


Book Description

"That buildings are made of elements doesn't mean that architecture should be based on elementarism; on the contrary, we should strive for an architecture of continuity that fuses tectonics with textile, abstraction with empathy, and matter with expressivity." This is the crux of the argument Lars Spuybroek makes in this book, the first fully theoretical account of his innovative work. The state of contemporary architecture is the product of a 150-year battle between the Polytechnique and Beaux-Arts schools of design, which has forced us into a stalemate between the radically opposed positions of high-tech and sculpturism. Spuybroek aims to do no less than mend this rift through rethinking technology as an extension of our feeling senses, materiality as the realm of activity and agency, and structure as the result of genesis. Building on Gottfried Semper's materialist theory of architecture, he takes us from a philosophy of technology to a surprisingly historical argumentation that constantly revives the words of John Ruskin, William Hogarth and Wilhelm Worringer. Alongside a number of essays, the book contains extensive conversations in which we witness him refining and sharpening his arguments ("We will see a merging of Art Nouveau and Bauhaus, where empathy has been liberated from manual labor and machines have been liberated from uniform repetition"). In a period of theoretical tranquility in architecture, this book takes a refreshing turn back to the basics, one in which tools, methodology and architectural aesthetics are recalibrated.










Coherence, Continuity, and Cohesion


Book Description

There is a need for general theoretical principles describing/explaining effective design -- those which demonstrate "unity" and enhance comprehension and usability. Theories of cohesion from linguistics and of comprehension in psychology are likely sources of such general principles. Unfortunately, linguistic approaches to discourse unity have focused exclusively on semantic elements such as synonymy or anaphora, and have ignored other linguistic elements such as syntactic parallelism and phonological alliteration. They have also overlooked the non-linguistic elements -- visual factors such as typography or color, and auditory components such as pitch or duration. In addition, linguistic approaches have met with criticism because they have failed to explain the relationship between semantic cohesive elements and coherence. On the other hand, psychological approaches to discourse comprehension have considered the impact of a wider range of discourse elements -- typographical cuing of key terms to enhance comprehension -- but have failed to provide general theoretical explanations for such observations. This volume uses Gestalt theory to provide general principles for predicting one aspect of coherence -- that of continuity -- across the entire range of discourse elements, and also to outline the relationship between cohesion and coherence. The theoretical core of this book argues that the cognitive principles that explain why humans "sense" unity in a succession of sounds (a whole musical piece) or in a configuration of visual shapes (a complete object) are the basis of principles which explain why we "sense" unity in oral, written, and electronically produced documents.




Business Continuity and Risk Management


Book Description

As an instructor, you have seen business continuity and risk management grow exponentially, offering an exciting array of career possibilities to your students. They need the tools needed to begin their careers -- and to be ready for industry changes and new career paths. You cannot afford to use limited and inflexible teaching materials that might close doors or limit their options. Written with your classroom in mind,Business Continuity and Risk Management: Essentials of Organizational Resilience is the flexible, modular textbook you have been seeking -- combining business continuity and risk management. Full educator-designed teaching materials available for download. From years of experience teaching and consulting in Business Continuity and Risk, Kurt J. Engemann and Douglas M. Henderson explain everything clearly without extra words or extraneous philosophy. Your students will grasp and apply the main ideas quickly. They will feel that the authors wrote this textbook with them specifically in mind -- as if their questions are answered even before they ask them. Covering both Business Continuity and Risk Management and how these two bodies of knowledge and practice interface, Business Continuity and Risk Management: Essentials of Organizational Resilience is a state-of-the-art textbook designed to be easy for the student to understand -- and for you, as instructor, to present. Flexible, modular design allows you to customize a study plan with chapters covering: Business Continuity and Risk principles and practices. Information Technology and Information Security. Emergency Response and Crisis Management. Risk Modeling – in-depth instructions for students needing the statistical underpinnings in Risk Management. Global Standards and Best Practices Two real-world case studies are integrated throughout the text to give future managers experience in applying chapter principles to a service company and a manufacturer. Chapter objectives, discussion topics, review questions, numerous charts and graphs. Glossary and Index. Full bibliography at the end of each chapter. Extensive, downloadable classroom-tested Instructor Resources are available for college courses and professional development training, including slides, syllabi, test bank, discussion questions, and case studies. Endorsed by The Business Continuity Institute (BCI) and The Institute of Risk Management (IRM). QUOTES "It's difficult to write a book that serves both academia and practitioners, but this text provides a firm foundation for novices and a valuable reference for experienced professionals."--Security Management Magazine "The authors...bring the subject to life with rich teaching and learning features, making it an essential read for students and practitioners alike." – Phil AUTHOR BIOS Kurt J. Engemann, PhD, CBCP, is the Director of the Center for Business Continuity and Risk Management and Professor of Information Systems in the Hagan School of Business at Iona College. He is the editor-in-chief of the International Journal of Business Continuity and Risk Management Douglas M. Henderson, FSA, CBCP, is President of Disaster Management, Inc., and has 20+ years of consulting experience in all areas of Business Continuity and Emergency Response Management. He is the author of Is Your Business Ready for the Next Disaster? and a number of templates.