Disaster recovery plans exist to help an organisation recover from a disaster and get back to normal. Meanwhile, business continuity plans help organisations stay in operation following an unexpected business interruption.

Involved stakeholders in developing a disaster recovery policy should include business leaders, IT staff, human resources personnel, security personnel, legal representation and external consultants and vendors. All of these individuals should work together to develop an effective plan or policy that will ensure the proper recovery of the organization's critical data in the event of a disaster.

Typically, they include an overview of the organisation, its systems and processes, contact information for key personnel, and steps for recovering from a disaster or continuing operations in the event of an interruption, such as who is responsible for what, how to communicate with employees and customers, and what resources are needed.

Here are a few examples of disaster recovery procedures:
Develop and document a detailed Disaster Recovery Plan that outlines the steps to be taken in order to restore operations.
Identify and prioritise vital applications, systems, and data that need to be recovered.
Establish communication protocols for sharing information regarding the disaster recovery process.
Utilise data backup services or cloud storage solutions to store important documents and backups.
Monitor the progress of recovery efforts during and after the disaster.
Test the disaster recovery plan regularly to ensure its efficacy.

Additionally a data recovery plan and a system backup plan should form part of your disaster recovery planning.

The One Point offers various services to help organisations develop and implement effective DR and BC plans, including consultancy, training, and software tools. We can help you reduce the impact of disasters on your people, customers, and stakeholders and ensure your business can continue to operate in a disaster.

DR and BC plans should be updated regularly to remain relevant and practical. Typically, a management team should make updates at least once a year or whenever significant changes to the organisation's structure or operations, such as changes to key staff members.

A Disaster Recovery Point Objective (DRPO) is a metric that sets a target for the maximum data loss an organisation is willing to accept in order to ensure continuity of operations in case of a disaster. This metric is used as a guide during the planning process for disaster recovery strategies, and should be set after taking into consideration both the potential risks posed by disasters and the cost associated with a full data recovery effort.

A Recovery Time Objective (RTO) is a metric that sets the expected maximum duration of time that it should take to bring back systems and data in order to resume operations after a disruption or disaster. This metric should be determined based on the organization's risk assessment, cost analysis, hardware & software requirements, and any external regulations or standards. For example, an RTO might be set at 48 hours that would require all systems and data to be fully functional within two days of the start of the recovery process.

Organisations that don't have a DR or BC plan are at a significant disadvantage. They are more likely to experience downtime, loss of data and negatively impact customers and employees in a disaster. In addition, they may be subject to fines and other penalties from regulatory agencies. They may have saved money in the short term, but their lack of planning may leave them worse off in the long run.