No matter how prepared you are, disasters can still strike without warning. Whether it’s a natural disaster, cyberattack, or system crash, an unexpected event can cause catastrophic data loss if you don’t have a recovery plan.
As such, IT disaster recovery planning is extremely important. Your organization needs a strategy in place so you can recover data, systems, and business processes as quickly as possible and with minimal losses.
So, what is IT disaster recovery, and how can you design IT disaster recovery plans? Let’s explore.
What is IT Disaster Recovery?
IT disaster recovery is a process or strategy for restoring IT infrastructure, data, and applications after an incident. Whenever a disaster strikes, your company’s IT disaster recovery plans will guide IT teams and employees through the steps they need to take to get back up and running with minimal disruptions.
However, IT disaster recovery planning isn’t just about being reactive. It also encompasses the preparations, backups, and contingencies an organization creates in advance. This way, should a disaster occur, the groundwork for recovery is already in place.
IT Disaster Recovery Plan
An IT disaster recovery plan is a structured, documented approach to restoring your IT systems should a disaster strike. This includes plans and guidelines for:
Data backup and recovery, so important data remains safe in the event of an emergency
Resource allocation, so that teams have the resources they need to recover and resume operations efficiently
Communication during emergencies, to keep everyone connected and coordinated even when main systems go down
With these key points in mind, you can begin your IT disaster recovery planning.
Why is Effective Disaster Recovery Planning Essential?
One of the most dangerous sentences in the English language is a rhetorical “What’s the worst that could happen?” IT disaster recovery planning identifies and prepares for the worst so that you know what could happen and are ready for it.
Having a good IT disaster recovery plan in place is essential, as it provides benefits including:
Minimizing downtime after a disaster, as you have the plans and preparations in place to recover and get back up to speed quickly
Protecting critical data, since backups and redundancies help ensure nothing vital is lost beyond recovery
Ensuring business continuity, since a good disaster recovery plan will help keep your organization running smoothly with minimal disruptions
Reducing losses, as disaster recovery will help you recover anything damaged or lost
Safeguarding customer trust, since efficient recovery ensures customers don’t lose anything and shows that they can trust you
Common Types of IT Disasters
While IT disaster recovery covers multiple types of disasters, these can take very different forms. Knowing what kinds of disasters can strike, what can cause them, and what damage they can cause will help you expect the unexpected.
Common types of IT disasters include:
1. Natural Disasters
Just because your data is stored digitally doesn’t mean it’s safe from natural disasters. Catastrophes like fires, earthquakes, and floods can damage buildings and servers, shut off power, and shut down transportation.
When physical infrastructure is damaged, you need a disaster recovery plan to recover your data from offsite and keep employees working safely from anywhere.
2. Hardware/Software Failure
Technology is fallible, and sometimes it can fail in an exceptionally large way. When hardware or software crashes and can’t be quickly restored, it’s important to have backups and contingency plans to ensure nothing irreplaceable is lost.
3. Cyberattacks
Malicious hackers and other bad actors are a frequent threat to businesses of all sizes, whether they’re looking to steal data, infect a system with ransomware, or just cause chaos. Companies need strong security features to protect against intrusion and plans for recovery should anyone break through.
(Want to know how Splashtop protects against hackers and malware? Learn aboutSplashtop’s security features and see.)
4. Human Error
Mistakes can happen, and sometimes those mistakes can have major ramifications. While training and education are important proactive defenses against human error, there’s no guaranteed protection against small but catastrophic mistakes. As such, companies need IT disaster recovery plans that account for human error.
Key Components of an Effective Disaster Recovery Plan
Now that we understand the importance of an IT disaster recovery plan, it’s time to examine what goes into creating an effective one. A good disaster recovery plan needs to encompass multiple factors, including:
1. Risk Assessment
First, understand what the biggest risks to your business are. While you must consider each potential threat, not all organizations will have to worry about the same types of natural disasters or hardware failures.
Look at what potential threats and vulnerabilities you may face, and evaluate the likeliness of each occurrence and their impact. This will help you identify the biggest risks to watch out for and prioritize in your disaster recovery strategy.
2. Business Impact Analysis
While any sort of disaster will be a major setback, it’s important to know what the impact will be. Consider what systems are the most important and which ones are a lower priority so that you can properly allocate resources for recovery.
This will help you understand the cost of downtime, set priorities, and determine how frequently you should perform backups for disaster recovery.
3. Data Backup Methods
One of the most important aspects of an IT disaster recovery plan is backing up and recovering all your important files and data. This requires on-site and offsite backups to keep important information safe, even in the face of disaster.
It’s recommended to include multiple data backup and recovery strategies so that all your bases are covered. Plans should also consider automated backup processes and real-time monitoring to keep all backups secure and up-to-date.
4. Recovery Procedures
Keeping critical data and information safe is only part of the formula. Being able to recover quickly is also essential.
Quick data restoration is vital for getting business processes back up and running. Your backups need to be easily accessible and prioritized so you can get essential processes and data restored first, thus minimizing downtime and interruptions.
5. Roles and Responsibilities
When disaster strikes, you don’t want people with vital roles in the recovery process sitting around wondering if they should be doing anything. You need to lay out the roles and responsibilities so everyone knows what they need to do and how to do it.
You can provide playbooks and training to help prepare your teams for disaster recovery, as well as run simulations and drills. Then, should anything occur, everyone will know what’s needed and expected of them.
Steps to Create a Disaster Recovery Plan
So, how does one create an IT disaster recovery plan? Following these key steps will keep you on the right track and ensure your bases are covered:
1. Identify Key Assets
The first step is to identify and understand your priorities. Assuming everything crashes and needs recovery, what needs restoration first? What comes next? What are the vital assets you can’t work without, and what can wait? Identifying your key assets will help you prioritize your IT disaster recovery planning.
2. Assess Risks
This is where you should ask “What’s the worst that can happen?” in all seriousness. Identify the worst-case scenario, how likely it is, and any other risks. Understand your vulnerabilities and the likelihood of any given disaster occurring, and use that knowledge to plan accordingly.
3. Set RTOs and RPOs
There are two important metrics to consider when creating your IT disaster recovery plan: the recovery time objective (RTO) and the recovery point objective (RPO).
RTO focuses on the maximum acceptable time you can take to get critical systems back online, while the RPO focuses on the amount of data loss that falls within acceptable limits. Understanding these metrics helps you set goals and standards for your recovery plans.
4. Test Regularly
No matter how well thought out or detailed an IT disaster recovery plan is, it won’t do you any good if your team is unprepared to use it. Regular testing is essential to ensure your IT team understands the plan and process, everyone knows their roles, and data is properly backed up and saved. This will also help identify any weak points or oversights that must be addressed, should it be necessary.
Best Practices for IT Disaster Recovery
When you start your IT disaster recovery planning, you’ll want to follow certain best practices and guidelines. Keep these pointers in mind and you’ll be well-prepared should the worst happen:
Backup data regularly: Your backups will be key to restoring any data lost during a disaster. If these backups are outdated, you’ll risk losing more recent (but still vital) data that can’t be easily recovered.
Maintain offsite backups: If you store all your backups in the same location as your business, there’s a good chance that all of them could be lost in a disaster. Instead, make sure you have offsite backups that will remain safe if anything happens to your physical location.
Keep your data protected: Hackers and other bad actors are as much a threat to data as any natural disaster. Be sure you have strong security measures in place so that your data and backups remain secure and you stay compliant with all relevant security standards.
Practice and prepare: The importance of preparation can’t be overstated. You need to run simulations and practice disaster recovery until it becomes second nature, otherwise your recovery efforts will be slow and inefficient should you ever need them.
Strengthen Disaster Recovery with Splashtop’s Remote Access Solutions – Try for Free
When disaster strikes, your IT team and employees will need to be able to work from anywhere. For that, you need Splashtop.
Splashtop is a powerful remote access solution that lets employees work from anywhere, on any device. Should a disaster strike, employees and IT agents can access their computers and projects wherever they go, helping companies maintain business continuity with minimal disruptions. With Splashtop’s remote IT support software, IT agents can efficiently support end users and managed devices to help with the recovery process no matter where they are.
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