If your business had a fire, flood or ICT failure, have you considered how you would set about finding temporary premises, meeting your deadlines or making sure your staff and suppliers are kept informed?
Many small firms never return to 'business as usual' after a serious crisis. Making a business continuity plan can help your business to survive and carry on.
The council must offer business continuity advice to small and medium sized businesses (under The Civil Contingencies Act 2004). If you require more information, or help to understand how a business continuity plan can be of benefit to your company, school or community group then please contact our Civil Contingencies Team.
The government has produced a Business Continuity Management Toolkit to help guide you through the steps needed to implement business continuity in your organisation.
In addition, the Business Continuity Institute offers advice on best practice, self-assessment tools and a business continuity consultancy register.
What is Business Continuity?
Business Continuity is defined as the capability of an organisation to manage the recovery or continuation of business activities at acceptable, pre-defined levels following a disruptive incident.
Business Continuity Management is the process any company, small, medium or large, should undertake to identify risks to the business and the impact they may cause and to document the procedures which will enable you to respond, recover and restore to your pre-defined level of operation following disruption.
The Business Continuity Plan is the 'living' document that is produced as a result of this process.
The Sussex Resilience Forum produce the Community Risk Register which outlines the main risks in Sussex. Find details of the main business continuity risks they have considered.