SMBs & Disaster Recovery

It’s a pretty well known fact that small to medium size businesses (SMBs) are the backbone of our economy.  Depending on what article you are reading an SMB is defined as a business that employs less than 500 employees.  In the city of Spokane, in 2007 99.8% of our local businesses fell in to that category.   85% (11,058) of our businesses fell into the small business (<20 employees) category. Every locale is different — what doesi t look like in your corner of the world?

Another well known fact, to those of us that work in the business continuity arena, is that SMBs often run lean and go without basic protections against operational risks, due to lack of time, budget and staff resources.  That includes disaster recovery and business continuity planning.  Published figures indicate that 60 to 65 percent of SMBs do not plan and those that do, don’t ever test their DR plans. That’s not good! 

A survey conducted by Symantec in September of 2009 with businesses that actually do plan for disasters produced some interesting statistics – Symantec 2009 SMB Disaster Preparedness Survey.  Check out the North American Data.

The survey centered on the SMBs disaster recovery planning efforts – the recovery of their technology (systems / data) following a major disruption.  The survey identified a significant difference on how the respondents to the survey perceived their level of disaster preparedness versus their actual level of preparedness.

The majority (>80%) of the SMBs surveyed were “quite confident” in their DR plans and the level of protection.  In excess of 60% believed that their customers would wait patiently for them to recover or call to get what they could and then wait patiently for recovery.  38 percent felt their customers would “evaluate other options that included looking at competitors.” Wait till you see what the customers had to say!

Symantec’s survey indicated that the confidence level was “misplaced.”  In the end Symantec reports that in reality SMBs are “remarkably unprepared” based on their response to the survey. Several issues were pointed out.  Here is what I observed:

• 50 – 59% of the respondents indicated that the percentage of company / customer data backed up was only 27%.   Overall it was only 40% of the company data – that is scary
• Only 16% of the respondents indicated that they back up their computer systems and information daily, and 11% weekly – that could result in a lot of lost data and scary as well
• 63% indicated they would lose 40 percent of their company data should they experience a major fire.  Not good at all from a business continuance perspective – it’s probably not going to happen

In addition, what I found most interesting was that Symantec solicited input from the SMBs customers. Almost 40% of those customers surveyed indicated that they have actually switched vendors in the past due to unreliable technology and the impact it had on their business.  The bottom line is this – if you are an SMB and have a high reliance on company / client data can you afford to lose 40% of your customers following a major business disruption?

As pointed out in the Symantec survey, it is recommended that SMBs follow best practices:

• Determine your needs: — Identify what’s critical and what’s not.  Establish a priority.  Monitor risk and prevent threats that the organization might face
• Engage trusted advisors – Look to a solution provider to help create plans, implement solutions and monitor trends and threats
• Automate where you can – Automate the backup process, ensure the timely and regular backup of your systems and data
• Test annually – ensure your return on investment and plan viability

I encourage you to read the Symantec article / survey.  If you don’t have a plan I encourage you develop one.  If you have an existing plan, take the time to ensure it is viable and would meet the needs of your organization in order to ensure business continuity following a major business disruption.