Business Continuity Plan (BCP) is a valuable tool for being prepared in the event of an unforeseen disaster which impacts your business. Most organizations will readily agree with this fact that a BCP is needed. However there is great disagreement within organizations when the question arises “how much planning is enough?”.
A BCP is a great hedge against unforeseen business interruptions, but it does come at a cost. Creating, revising and testing a BCP costs both time and money; time of employees spent writing and testing the plan, plus money spent on contracts with backup vendors and consultants. This is when management begins to question the value of BCP and decisions need to be made to balance the scope of contingency planning against the cost. At what point are you spending too much for the value you are receiving?
BCP development and implementation by an outsourced consulting company with can easily cost $100,000 or more depending on the scope of the plan and complexity of the organization. Developing your own BCP internally using a template or software incurs the cost of your resources (employee time X hourly rate or salary). This may be more cost effective for smaller organizations with limited operations and locations.
Regardless of the approach taken, the true value is the remediation of potential losses vs. the cost of BCP. The questions to ask are
BCP development and implementation by an outsourced consulting company with can easily cost $100,000 or more depending on the scope of the plan and complexity of the organization. Developing your own BCP internally using a template or software incurs the cost of your resources (employee time X hourly rate or salary). This may be more cost effective for smaller organizations with limited operations and locations.
Regardless of the approach taken, the true value is the remediation of potential losses vs. the cost of BCP. The questions to ask are
- “How much does cost to be down for a day…for 5 days…for 10 days…?” and
- “What are the highest risk areas which will hit the bottom line the most and the fastest?”