Filed under: Business, Security, Utilities, Productivity, Freeware
Five Ways to Manage Disaster
How do you plan for business IT disaster? Your business has Heimlich maneuver posters displayed, signs for first aid on the wall, evacuation routes for fire prominent near the doors and took out damage insurance coverage on your notebook computers. You just missed one small piece of the puzzle: business recovery. Without it, a small business cannot withstand even one natural or employee-induced catastrophe. It's estimated that 25% of all small businesses cannot withstand a natural disaster. Is yours one of them?Here are five disaster situations and what you "coulda shoulda" do to plan for them.
FIRE EARTHQUAKE TERRORISM FLOOD WATER DAMAGE TORNADO: Are you scared yet? Do you have the backup hardware in place to survive and be up and running within 30 days? In the late 90s, 5 buildings went up in a frightening blaze in a nearby city and I pulled up-to-the-minute financials off a smoldering server via dialup (we got 'em, but it was harrowing). Is your backup drive in place and tested? Do you have a readable tape backup from yesterday in an off-site location that you know about? If not, make sure you have (a) good data backup systems and (b) a backup drive and 7 tapes (one to keep off-site) and are paying someone to be in charge of rotating them daily.
Hints:
- Backup to a second drive, NOT to your computer's hard drive. Good software will not allow same-drive backups.
- Shut down Outlook at night or your email will not be backed up.
- Burn the data on the tapes or portable drive to a DVD once in a while.
- Windows Vista SP1 lets you create a recovery disk. Create several and store in different places.
- If your CDs or DVDs are damaged, use CD Recovery Toolbox instead of drinking hemlock .
DATA DISGRUNTLEMENT: Could your company's mission-critical data fall victim to a disgruntled employee? We've talked about securing your domain and urged you to organize your logo and business-critical graphics, so let's add ensuring that your critical data does not fall prey to disgruntlement. Once you have the hardware (tape drives, external USB hard drives), and even though Windows XP Pro has free backup utilities (Start /All Programs /Accessories /System Tools / Backup - go here if you have Windows XP Home), there are free programs with reminders and classy schedulers you can use:
While you're at it, make sure there's a copy of your site on a local computer. But back up the site anyway: get the Firefox add-in ScrapBook so you can save and organize Web pages or an entire site. It's not the same as a full and complete backup of your site (with the background databases that are beyond critical) but it can help with disaster recovery.
These tools promise to download a complete site and are free.
PLAN FOR DISASTER: Make a disaster plan. If you have yet to read the fire extinguisher directions and plan to do so during a fire, a disaster plan should be written prior to tragedy.
Be sure you know how you're going to communicate with workers and customers. Review these free documents:
- Backup2zip - Will not backup locked files if they are in use (see "shut down Outlook" above)
- ICE Mirror - Creates exact duplicate of original directories and allows differential updates
- Freebyte Backup - For Windows; easy copy and filter from various sources into one backup directory
- Find a bunch more free backup programs here.
While you're at it, make sure there's a copy of your site on a local computer. But back up the site anyway: get the Firefox add-in ScrapBook so you can save and organize Web pages or an entire site. It's not the same as a full and complete backup of your site (with the background databases that are beyond critical) but it can help with disaster recovery.
These tools promise to download a complete site and are free.
- HTTrack Website Copier (looks to be the best of the bunch)
- Backstreet Browser (offline tool)
- Website Puller
- Go to this site to see more free Web site downloaders and to read reviews.
PLAN FOR DISASTER: Make a disaster plan. If you have yet to read the fire extinguisher directions and plan to do so during a fire, a disaster plan should be written prior to tragedy.
Be sure you know how you're going to communicate with workers and customers. Review these free documents:
- Communicating in a Crisis [PDF] Part 1 and Part 2 as a starting guide.
- Get a free disaster safety review here [PDF] or the Open for Business [PDF] booklet here.
- There's a useful disaster planning checklist here.
So, just how good at time waster games are you? Think you've got the stuff? Well, The World's Hardest Game 2.0 doesn't think you do.
Yes, amazingly, it's possible to have a sequel to a game called "The World's Hardest Game". It doesn't seem logically possible, since if the first one was actually the world's hardest, how could another one come along and share the moniker? It made me doubt the name in the first place. That is, until I tried the game.
The mechanics of the game are very simple. You are a small red square, ...
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Peter said 1:21PM on 1-09-2008
All good tips. Don't forget it doesn't even have to be something this dramatic.
They were doing construction on the street outside our office, hit a gas line and we all had to be evacuated on short notice. Nothing ended up happening, but it easily could have. Be sure you have ways of contacting critical employees and vendors if you can't physically get into your offices.
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Sue said 3:40PM on 1-09-2008
Right, Peter. In fact, sometimes is the smaller unforeseen problems that create the biggest disasters. I'm reminded of a single RAID drive that failed... and a smoldering motherboard.
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Matias Korhonen said 4:18PM on 1-09-2008
Personally I prefer #6:
Step 1: Shout "Aargh!" loudly
Step 2: Shout out some profanities (e.g. "What the F*")
Step 3: Move to muttering profanities under your breath
Step 4: PANIC
Much, Much simpler...
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