BCM has undergone many changes in recent years, both in scale and scope.
It has come a long way from its tactical beginnings in computer disaster recovery. It is now moving towards a much more business focussed position within the organisation. A recent poll of the ICAEW’s (The Institute of Chartered Accountants for England and Wales) IT faculty revealed that 62%1 of respondents now place responsibility for operational risk prevention and resilience planning at the C-level.
This change has been driven fundamentally by the changes in expectations about how organisations should respond to a business interruption.
Given the competitive nature of the UK economy, if an organisation has a business interruption, there will be several other suppliers who will happily step into the gap. To prevent this situation occurring, it is the organisation’s general management that is increasingly driving BCM rather than the IT function.
This paper assesses the evolution of Business Continuity Management (BCM) from its traditional technology roots, towards a more business focussed approach. It also considers the value of BCM Software as an enabler of this transition.