For IT companies in Miami and Fort Lauderdale, disaster recovery plan development is often not on their priority list. However, any company of any size needs a basic plan in place. And as your business grows and your list of clients lengthens, the need becomes even greater. What would happen to your company if a hurricane hits your business office? You might be able to recover your physical location. But, can you handle losing all of your company’s computer data? For most companies, that would spell the end of the company. Making a basic disaster plan is imperative.

After Hurricane Andrew, many South Florida companies learned the hard way that they need a disaster recovery plan in place. And businesses in New Orleans found out the same thing after Hurricane Katrina. So what do you need in one of these plans? The basic plan needs to outline exactly what measures you will take to make sure your company can go on if something disastrous happens to your IT infrastructure. But, it is not just a matter of putting things down on a document and then putting the document on the shelf. This plan needs to go into active effect and the company should update it regularly.

The business owner(s) need to support this idea completely. If you are a sole proprietorship, that is easy. But, for larger companies, that can be more complicated. Every department needs to have input into the plan. What might work for IT might not be a good idea of accounting and vice versa. What risks does your company face? How would your company function if your main office could no longer function due to a natural or manmade disaster? These are both issues you need to address in your disaster recovery planning.

Part of disaster recovery planning is prioritizing what is more important for the business to run. Each department will rank differently as far as their functional operations, vital records, legal requirements, etc. The plan also needs to require each department to document their critical functions thoroughly. And as things change, that documentation needs to keep up to date. Backup strategies are only the beginning of comprehensive disaster recovery planning. If you do not know where to start, you might consider bringing in outside consultants to help you get the plan under way. It would make sense to have an outside perspective and expertise for such an important item in any company.