Promoting Business Continuity

Business Continuity Awareness Week (BCAW) is an opportunity for you to showcase your organization’s business continuity program or highlight the need for an enhanced program.

Consider using the following promotional suggestions during and beyond BCAW to introduce or elevate your organization’s readiness to respond to known or unplanned events that may be disruptive in nature. You are encouraged to modify and customize these ideas to take into account your organization’s culture and the maturity of your business continuity management program.

Awareness and Education

Awareness

• Encourage your business groups to include Business Continuity Management as an agenda item during their staff meeting this week.
• Encourage your business groups to circulate and update their contact lists / call trees, etc.
• Encourage your business groups to review their evacuation procedures including the involvement of your building managers to conduct fire drills that week.
• Include articles in your corporate newsletters and/or on your intranet website.
  • Annual schedule of BCM related activities (BIA review, BCP revisions, planned exercises, etc.)
  • Business specific
  • For business clients and partners (vendors, suppliers, outsourcers, etc.)
  • For employees and their families
• Have fun! Host contests to enhance Business Continuity awareness across your organization

Education

• Conduct refresher sessions for your experienced Business Continuity Coordinators
• Conduct training sessions for new Business Continuity Coordinators
• Conduct refresher and / or training sessions for your Executives
• Conduct refresher and/or training sessions for your governance groups (compliance, audit, risk management, etc.)
• Conduct training sessions for employees

Business Continuity Exercises

• Launch your exercise schedule for the year during this week
• Conduct a tabletop exercise with your executives
• Conduct tabletop exercises across your business units
• Conduct component exercises such as:
  • Call tree activation
  • Command centre readiness
  • Tabletop exercises with external business partners
    

Lunch & Learn Seminars / Open Houses / Business Partner Sessions

• Conduct lunch & learn sessions across your organization
  • Introduction to BCM
  • What's happening in the industry?
  • Show casing "best practices" within your organization - encourage business units to share their experiences and successes
  • Invite governance groups (compliance, audit, risk management, etc.) to present their perspectives on Business Continuity
  • Personal readiness
• Host an Open House internally for employees and / or externally for clients
• Tour(s) of your recovery location(s)
• Vendor display of products / services available
• Show case internal "best practices"
• Conduct mini-awareness sessions
• Invite executives to participate to endorse management commitment
• Invite your business partners (vendors, suppliers, outsourcers, etc.) to participate with your organization:
• Sessions to share their Business Continuity Management program
• Sessions to share the interdependencies of your organization and your business partner
• Invite Business Continuity related vendors to share their products / services.

Business continuity management can be a challenge at the best of times. Sharing promotional ideas across industry will not only enhance our own organizations but also contribute to the overall readiness of our critical infrastructure as a nation. You are encouraged to take the ideas presented, enhance and exploit them and most importantly share your successes with your colleagues.