Datacenter recovery may be necessary when equipment breaks down, a storm impacts your office space or information is removed or hacked. However, it occurs, it can be devastating to a business, especially when sensitive personal or financial information is involved. For some, it may be essential work files, setting the business back or putting it in a difficult position with customers.
Having a plan for datacenter recovery, if it does happen to you, can make a big difference in the time your data is unavailable. The smartest approach is to take steps to protect your data and receive alerts of anything that goes wrong right away. Having the right staff trained to work with your equipment in a jiffy can facilitate business continuity and reduce the risk of information loss.
Creating a Data Disaster Plan
1. Understand Vulnerabilities
Do you have every employees’ data backing up to a local server? Does that local server back up to a cloud-based server? If your office were to suffer the blow of a hurricane and your server were damaged, is your information protected at another, safe location? These are important considerations. Having a cloud-based back-up performed daily ensures all your work and information is up to date if the time comes you need to replace or repair a damaged local server. If your network has vulnerabilities, you need to be aware of them and come up with a solution to prevent failure and data loss.
2. List Inventory
An important piece of creating a good plan is having a comprehensive list of all equipment, logging its status, where its information backs up and the health of the equipment. Which pieces of equipment are most important? If the power goes down, does every computer have its information stored in another location? Are there redundancies in place to provide online access when one source fails? IT personnel need to have this information on hand when a problem does arise.
3. Getting Back to Work
The recent Covid-19 pandemic has taught us all the importance of having remote access to all our everyday files and software programs to operate outside of the office space. Putting systems in place to work from other locations while the office space is uninhabitable or local computers are down is a smart plan to ensure the business can operate seamlessly.
When employees do return to work, they may be using new equipment. If it is necessary some return to the office sooner than others due to the nature of their work, ensure their new equipment is operational and their files are available to begin working again. As the business grows and new equipment is added, be sure to update your strategy accordingly. Test to make sure your back-ups are working and that every computer and laptop is backing up to the appropriate location.
Many small companies simply do not have staff trained to handle datacenter recovery. Using an outside company to take inventory of your equipment, plan a backup strategy and ensure connectivity redundancy can make recovering from a disaster easier to manage and significantly reduce the downtime.
