Why It Matters
Every organization will face disruptions — ransomware attacks, power outages, pandemics, key supplier failures. The difference between organizations that survive and those that don't is preparation. NIS2 explicitly requires business continuity planning for essential and important entities, and ISO 22301 provides a certifiable framework for resilience.
Key Components
Business Impact Analysis (BIA)
- Identify critical business functions and processes
- Determine maximum tolerable downtime for each
- Assess financial, operational, and reputational impact of disruption
- Define Recovery Time Objectives (RTO) and Recovery Point Objectives (RPO)
Business Continuity Plan (BCP)
- Response procedures — immediate actions when disruption occurs
- Communication plan — who to notify, when, and how
- Alternate work arrangements — remote work, alternate sites
- Resource requirements — people, technology, facilities
- Roles and responsibilities — incident commander, team leads
Disaster Recovery (DR)
Focused specifically on IT systems:
- Backup strategy — 3-2-1 rule (3 copies, 2 media types, 1 offsite)
- Recovery procedures — step-by-step system restoration
- Failover capabilities — automatic switching to backup systems
- Testing — regular DR drills and tabletop exercises
Testing and Maintenance
- Tabletop exercises — discussion-based scenario walkthroughs
- Simulation exercises — realistic disruption scenarios
- Full-scale tests — actual failover to backup systems
- Annual review — update plans based on changes, lessons learned
Regulatory Requirements
| Regulation | Business Continuity Requirement |
|---|---|
| NIS2 | Mandatory business continuity and crisis management (Article 21) |
| DORA | ICT-related incident management and digital operational resilience testing |
| ISO 22301 | Certifiable Business Continuity Management System standard |
| GDPR | Article 32 — ability to restore availability and access to personal data in a timely manner |
| SOX | Contingency planning for financial reporting systems |
Key Metrics
- RTO (Recovery Time Objective) — maximum acceptable time to restore a function
- RPO (Recovery Point Objective) — maximum acceptable data loss measured in time
- MTPD (Maximum Tolerable Period of Disruption) — beyond this, the organization faces existential risk
Key Standards
- ISO 22301:2019 — Business Continuity Management Systems
- ISO 22313 — guidance on using ISO 22301
- NIS2 Article 21(2)(c) — business continuity and crisis management
- NIST SP 800-34 — Contingency Planning Guide for Federal Information Systems