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Introducing Buisness Continuity Management Team (BCMT)

Posted on 01 December 2010.

Introducing Buisness Continuity Management Team (BCMT)

 

During the latter part of 2010 the STW Management Team busily worked with WMQC Consultants to further develop the Business Management System (BMS).  The BMS system comprised of ISO9001 and ISO14001 standards and now we have incorporated the BS25999 Business Continuity Management System.

So what is BS 25999?

A fundamental requirement for any organisation is continued operations in the event of a disruption, whether due to a major disaster or a minor incident.  British Standard, BS 25999 is the world's first Business Continuity Management (BCM) standard developed to minimize the risks of disruptions which affect the whole organization.

The standard is designed to keep the business going during the most challenging and unexpected circumstances. By helping to put the fundamentals of a BCM system in place, it protects staff, preserves the company’s reputation and provides the ability to continue to operate and trade.

BS25999 provides a basis for understanding, developing and implementing business continuity within the organisation and gives confidence in business-to-business and business-to-customer dealings. It also contains a comprehensive set of controls based on BCM best practice and covers the whole BCM lifecycle.

During October an exercise at Steps to Works Head Office at Challenge Building, was undertaken to test the business continuity plan and processes.  A scenario based on the a fire affecting normal services was used to test the plan and identified a number of improvements such as :

  • Introducing communications protocol, BCMT role cards
  • Work instructions for crash boxes, technological recovery
  • Improvements to the incident log, emergency procedures

An exercise report was compiled and discussed at SMT.  An evaluation by those involved was undertaken.  All this information was then used to develop an action plan which SMT agreed and MI Manager co-ordinated.  Through regular updates to SMT progress was monitored.

Steps to Work will develop, document and implement specific Business Continuity Plans in order to provide a response to each envisaged threat (risk) and to enable it to continue with its critical business operations based on its BC strategy. This requires the documenting of an overall Incident Response Structure which will include any requirements on third parties, as well as communication planning.

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