IT Service Continuity Management
Practical Case
The IT organisation of "Cater Matters" currently lacks any IT Service Continuity Management worthy of the name.
The management of "Cater Matters" is aware of the importance that IT services have today for its production and distribution and aims to rectify this situation.
The company's management considers that the IT services associated with stock management, given that the stock consists of perishable products, and online ordering, are those of greatest strategic importance. In the first instance they therefore decide that the ITSCM should guarantee the continuity of these services within not more than 8 hours. Less ambitious targets are set for other services.
A senior executive from the IT department is given the role of managing the process and charged with coordinating all the activities involved with Business Continuity Management.
Business Continuity Management has signed cooperation agreements with other catering companies for emergency supplies to cover the company's most important customers:
- Catering services for schools and hospitals.
- Conferences and other large events.
In these cases, coordination requires the development of special modules allowing order databases to be exported in standard data exchange formats so they can be processed by the other organisation.
Additionally, an emergency stock management application has been developed to allow supplier orders to be handled and ensure the integrity of existing stock is maintained, according to its expiry information and the impact of the business interruption on the stock.
The following are also established:
- A regular calendar of trials of the recovery plans.
- A calendar of training courses on action protocols in emergency situations.
However, IT Service Continuity Management not only has to apply reactive measures to mitigate the impact of a possible interruption to service. Its obligations also include the drafting of prevention plans to avoid these situations arising.
To avoid interruptions to its online services the ITSCM:
- Contracts collocation web hosting services with a provider that has connections through various operators to the Internet backbone and can ensure an uninterrupted power supply.
- Replicates critical systems at different geographical locations.
- Supervises the policy of back-ups of the data servers.
- Installs perimeter protection systems.
