Business resilience is the ability to maintain the commitment to serve your customers despite encountering unforeseen disasters. It is about emergency preparedness and more!
Imagine this:
The prototype has just been approved by the customer. This was what your team has been working on for the past year! And this has raised your production plan at an all-time high this month.
Just in time for your new batch of production, your supplier has delivered premium raw materials that passed quality control smoothly. You are encountering zero delays.
Even your employees are all motivated! The attendance rate has been steady and workmanship errors are minimal. There are quality issues but nothing that your facility manager cannot handle.
You are planning to expand your business as everything is going so smoothly that you cannot just pass up the opportunity to grow. You sit back and sip your favorite Americano. After all, a CEO also deserves to relax.
Suddenly, you get an email saying that all communication lines are down. The internet is down. There is a cyber-attack somewhere in the system!
The information systems department is doing all they can to restore the operation as soon as possible, safeguard any sensitive information, and block any further attempt.
Your mind starts racing to your ongoing production. There were missing process data that you need to recover. All it took was an hour of cyber-attack and you already lost hundreds of units that were misprocessed.
What will you do with the waste? How will you recuperate?
What will happen if that cyber-attack lasts for a day? A week? A month?
This is where business resilience planning is important for a company.
Why is business resilience important?
Based on the scenario above, you will likely incur losses. You will lose the scrapped units from the production that may have been damaged beyond repair.
Or, if those can be repaired, then, you will still lose time and more resources for the repair itself just to minimize waste.
The machines were not utilized for that hour when the attack happened and that means inefficiency in your operations.
There could be more losses in various forms such as lack of security and trust from your stakeholders. All these are possible risks to your business that you want to avoid by building up your business resilience.
The future of your business greatly relies on how you react to unforeseen unfavorable instances and ensure continuity. It is your reputation at stake.
Do not let your commitment to your customers be questioned. Do not let your business suffer and fall without a series of planned actions to undertake when similar disasters strike.
And if you have not planned yet, then, it is time to do so.
How to build business resilience
Set goals.
The first step is to determine your mission and vision and your key performance indices. These will be your guide in determining what aspects of the business or operation will need the utmost importance.
Is it your commitment to achieving the highest quality of products? Is it your commitment to supply your customers with their orders in the fastest way possible?
Have a team and involve leaders.
Organize a team of risk managers from every aspect of the operation who will be the decision-makers. A huge part of their responsibility is to ensure that the operation goes smoothly and uninterrupted by mitigating risks.
Establish an information route that will need to be followed to ensure proper escalation.
Assess the risks.
List down all business activities, the assets required to support these, and the risks associated with those in the list.
Risks involve the following but not limited to:
- cyber-attack and lack of information security
- natural disasters like a storm, blizzard, or earthquake
- terrorism, crime, and civil unrest
- supply chain disturbance
- health and safety threats
- accidents like fire
- lack of skilled manpower
Notice that not all these risks are emergency in kind. Some may take years to have a significant impact while others will cost you in just a matter of seconds.
Once you know the risks, it is then time to assess the severity and likelihood of occurrence of each one. Assign a value as agreed upon by the team doing the assessment. Then, assess which ones need immediate attention and act on them.
Develop a plan.
Check if there are existing controls and detection methods to address those disruptive events. A few questions that can guide you are the following:
- How will your business treat the possible outcome as a result of these circumstances? What series of actions need to happen?
- How fast can you recover and sustain operations? For how long can you maintain this?
- What is your disaster recovery plan is like? Is safeguarding people part of it?
- Do you perform succession planning?
- Do you have alternatives to assets?
- What course of action will you take to ensure continuous operation?
Review frequently.
Do not wait for the next disruptive event before you revisit your business resilience plan. Make sure to update it whenever possible.
Review the implementation and check if the programs are still effective. Continuously strive for improvement.
Future-proof your business with Milia Marketing
Fortunately, Cleveland is the second safest city in the US when it comes to the occurrence of natural disasters without accounting blizzards.
But even this city is not safe from the pandemic that is engulfing the world right now.
This pandemic has led to millions of job losses in Cleveland and the whole world. Some businesses closed down while others thrive.
And yes, it is still possible to thrive even in this pandemic! There are recession-proof businesses that still survive at this difficult time.
Many of these businesses have managed to shift their marketing strategies to digital. This move will ensure that no natural disaster or pandemic can stop them from promoting their products and services. This is business resilience in action.
In your business resilience planning, consider partnering with Milia Marketing when going digital. Start now!
