Natural disasters and other catastrophic events are increasingly disrupting business around the world. Hurricanes, fires and storms of 2012 show the importance of including robust business continuity management (BCM) with strategic planning. That is according to the US-based IT association ISACA. To help enterprises identify impacts that emerging technology trends can have on BCM, the association released a new white paper titled “Business Continuity: Emerging Trends
The complimentary white paper provides an overview of the impacts, benefits and opportunities of four emerging technologies as they relate to BCM: virtualization, cloud computing, mobile devices and social networks. It identifies challenges, and governance, assurance and risk management practices.
What they say
Salomon Rico, CISA, CISM, CGEIT, Deloitte Mexico Information and Technology Risk Services partner and chair of the white paper’s development team, said: “ISACA’s annual IT Risk/Reward Barometer survey
What affects business continuity can help enterprises build resilient infrastructures, design sustainable supply chains, and define communication and contingency procedures to restore critical business operations within acceptable recovery times. BCM should evolve as business practices and emerging technologies continue to shape the business landscape, the report suggests, and should address:
Greater customer expectations
Increased regulatory and legal requirements
The enterprise’s strategic planning to ensure proper alignment
Continuous improvement through regular reviews, testing and updates.
“ISACA’s new BCM guide does the legwork of identifying the trends that will impact enterprises’ risk profiles,” said Rico. “Managing these risks enables senior management to make better decisions for aligning BCM with business and IT strategies to meet shareholder, customer and regulatory expectations, and improve resilience and recovery capabilities.”
“Business Continuity: Emerging Trends” is available as a download at www.isaca.org/business-continuity
