by Frank Grillo

   This article was originally published in The Productivity Institute (PI) Newsletter

While the hyped-up impact of the misnamed Swine Flu pandemic turned out to be grossly exaggerated, the scenario provided a long-overdue reason for enterprises to ask, “What if it had been the real thing?” One need only look south to Mexico City to see in glaring reality the impact of a locked-down city and the effects on day-to-day communications and commerce. And though 2005 is a “distant past” at this point, if anyone finds Mexico City’s situation disturbing, it still pales in comparison to the tragedy of post-Katrina New Orleans.

Certainly those along the south Atlantic and Gulf Coasts of the U.S. have taken business continuity planning more seriously since the days of Katrina, and many large Northeast institutions have done likewise since the horrors of 9/11. But generally speaking, the majority of small-to-medium sized enterprises (SMEs) have let their business continuity planning languish, especially around their communications infrastructure. And it’s easy to understand why. If a business doesn’t face a potential catastrophe on a regular basis (like those in hurricane- and wildfire-prone regions), the likelihood of an enterprise-threatening event is fairly minimal, while the costs of preparing for one can be quite high.

But that’s one benefit that actually came from the pig flu scare: it’s brought to everyone’s attention just how costly a pandemic or other enterprise-disabling event would be. Given the span of places where the flu presented itself in relatively quick time span, it’s not too hard to imagine a lockdown in Anytown, USA.

Because SMEs typically have limited resources in time, personnel, and capital, they are the most vulnerable to experience losses due to lack of preparation, which is disturbing considering the following:
• What may be considered a nuisance for a larger company can spell disaster for a SME; business interruptions can be as large as a hurricane or as small as a power outage.
• If a business is inextricably tied to a brick-and-mortar building, any event that keeps employees from entering the building can spell disaster.
• The majority of SMEs who experience an interruption lasting 10 days or more never fully recover, and most close within two years.

While most small enterprises’ recovery plans include data backup, there is one important aspect of planning that is often overlooked: how employees and customers will continue communicating if a disruption occurs at the company’s premises. For most SMEs replicating a PBX at a second location and creating a failover procedure is just economically unfeasible. Nevertheless, ensuring communications in the event of a disruption is critical to the success of any company, and a robust hosted unified communications solution can offer unmatched continuity and disaster recovery capabilities.

Hosted communications can be implemented easily and with no capital expense on the part of the SME, no need to hire additional IT staff and no worries of technological obsolescence. And hosted unified communications offers a range of functionality that can replicate the conveniences of being in an office—allowing business to continue operating as usual—for any length of time.

Some CIOs look at hosted unified communications strictly as a business continuity solution, to provide recovery for specific parts of the enterprise that would be mission critical. Other CIOs are energized about hosted communications not only for the continuity it brings to the table, but also for the mobility and remote office support, the collaboration for their users and the savings in its no CapEx model.

With today’s hosted communications technology, every enterprise in the U.S. can operate “virtually” with employees scattered away from corporate offices, yet operating as if they were sitting side-by-side. To the outside world, the geographic distribution of the employees is transparent. Beyond the great flexibility this operational model provides, it enables SMEs to not just survive, but to continue thriving in the face of significant disaster, with little or no down time. Now that’s a very real competitive edge, and in today’s economic times, a necessity. Business executives owe it to themselves, their investors and their employees to take a close look at making their business truly survivable, no matter what happens at the physical location. 

Frank Grillo is a visionary communications executive known for his ability to identify growth opportunities and to produce extraordinary results that make a real contribution to an organization’s bottom line. Serving as executive vice president of marketing at Cypress Communications®, Frank Grillo is responsible for product management, pricing, marketing, advertising, and sales support of the company’s products, including Cypress’ award-winning hosted unified communications solution, C4 IP™. To learn more about hosted unified communications and Cypress’ C4 IP solution, go to www.cypresscom.net.