The single most important way you can ensure your business continuity in the case of a disaster is to have a good backup of your critical data. Here are some pointers:
1.) You should have backup copies of accounting data, customer lists, vendor lists, employee lists, and records related to your ongoing business (jobs/projects, etc.)
2.) Consider how you will re-create your network. You may need to borrow or rent PCs in order to re-load software and data.
3.) You should keep a copy of your backup offsite. In the event of a fire, for example, both your computers and your backup tapes might be ruined. An easy way to do this is to look at some of the cloud-based backup options and/or to co-locate your network at a hosting facility.
4.) Consider how many days of work you can afford to lose, and be sure you are backing up more frequently than that. If you can manage two days of re-creating work. At a minimum, you’d get a daily backup.
5.) If you opt to work with cloud-based products, be sure you understand how often those systems are backed up, and how quickly a restore could be performed.
These are just some starter points, but it’s important that you give them consideration. The thing about unplanned disasters is that you don’t see them coming. It’s not really a matter of IF you’ll lose some data, but WHEN.
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