Web-based, Collaborative BCP Consulting

We've taken our entire BCP methodology on line! No more invoices for travel expenses. No paying consultants to sit in airports. All of our BCP consulting services -- department interviews, training sessions, plan maintenance reviews -- even tabletop testing exercises -- can be conducted via the Internet.

We use an on-line collaboration system to create temporary, secure work space for each project. Anyone involved on the bank side can participate and track progress as the project unfolds.

All tasks, project milestones and deliverables are laid out in a user-friendly interface. There is space for secure file storage and a message board for BCP related communications. When the project is complete, all files and messages are archived and the workspace is taken down.

All meetings with department contacts can be conducted via the Internet using familiar screen-sharing technology. We can involve business unit staff in a meaningful way without pulling them away from their workstation, and without the hassle of setting up conference rooms, juggling technical resources, and granting network access to outsiders.

The result is a high-impact, low intrusion consulting experience. Much more efficient that the traditional delivery method, and at a lower cost.

Can self-directed teams manage BCP projects?

If you're responsible for Business Continuity Planning in a community bank, odds are you can only spend about 20% of your time on the project. If you're lucky.

Even if you can manage 20%, the time is not evenly distributed. BCP work comes in disruptive bursts, usually driven by the threat of an upcoming audit.

So idea of self-directed, "collaborative" BCP projects is tempting.

You know, where the work is distributed evenly across all business units. Featuring that slick BCP database application that looked so good in demo mode.

But what happens when the project ends badly, and you've got auditors breathing down your neck?

Bank Regulatory Examinations: Most Common BCP Findings 2012

Each year I spend a lot of time helping BCP Coordinators in banks prepare for regulatory examinations and audits. I also spend a lot of time preparing responses to examination findings.
So I have anecdotal evidence that I use to predict what the regulatory hot buttons will be in the coming examination cycle, at least as far as BCP is concerned.

Pandemic Simulation Exercises for Financial Institutions

We've developed a lightweight Pandemic Simulation Exercise that we can deliver via webinar. The only thing the bank has to provide in advance is is a simple two-column Excel spreadsheet - column A is the list of employees and Column B is their department.

Plans are nothing; planning is everything

Dwight D. Eisenhower, American President, General and Pennsylvania resident.

Twitter has become an indispensable emergency monitoring tool.

BCP Coordinators, Facilities managers and media relations managers should get familiar with social networking. Twitter in particular has become the "police scanner" of the Internet age.
You can use Twitter to monitor emergencies before, during and after the event. Crisis events from train wrecks to winter storms to hurricanes have one thing in common: Bursts of Twitter activity that includes snippets of text, pictures and video.

Should a Bank Store DR Plans in the Cloud?

Yes.
They should be stored on your smartphone, too!