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1.3 What is Business Continuity Management?

Hi, I’m David, a Team Lead at one of Accenture’s Business locations.

I’d like to share with you an incident that occurred in our office last week.
I was at the office with my team when an emergency forced us to leave the premises.
Due to the emergency, the facility was closed for a few days,
impacting our services to the client.
Fortunately, we had a business continuity plan in place,
and it was activated to support our work from a backup location.

The plan enabled us to continue to deliver critical services and provide support to our client. The client appreciated our preparedness to handle the emergency, and it actually resulted in more business for us.

Would you like to know how our team overcame this crisis situation?

Well, the team followed their business continuity plan with support from the Crisis Management team. At the team level, the Managers and Leads knew how to use the plan to support and manage the situation.

Business continuity is an important part of Accenture’s operations, and in this training, I’ll take you through the basics of Accenture’s business continuity management program. This training will help you gain awareness of Accenture’s approach to business continuity, and it will help you understand the importance of effective planning, preparedness and your role in the business continuity program.

Business continuity management is defined as

“A holistic management process that identifies potential threats to an organization and the impacts to business operations those threats, if realized, might cause, and which provides a framework for building organizational resilience with the capability of an effective response that safeguards the interests of its key stakeholders, reputation, brand and value-creating activities.”
(ISO: 22301)

Accenture considers business continuity as part of business as usual activities, and the business continuity program is supported by Policy 1476 and Policy 13.

Policy 1476 outlines the requirements for business units to implement appropriate continuity strategies for their business or functional areas to minimize business disruptions.

When it comes to handling a crisis, Policy 13 outlines the crisis management requirements for Accenture and is applied to all geographies. Crisis management is critical for handling major events that could lead to people safety, security risks or business disruption. The Crisis Management team operates at a global, regional and location level. The Crisis Management structure supports a cross section of events from geographic emergencies to cyber events and is a holistic element of the business continuity program.

In addition to these key policies, there are supporting policies, which include Policy 56 (System Security) that outlines the requirements for securing data and having the correct level of disaster recovery plans for technology systems

1.4 Did You Know?

The Accenture Business Continuity program has been established for well over a decade and is aligned to the International Industry Standard of ISO22301.

The Accenture Business Continuity program has been established for well over a decade and is aligned to the International Industry Standard of ISO22301.

The Accenture Business Continuity program has been established for
well over a decade and is aligned to the International Industry
Standard of ISO22301.

1.5 Key Focus Areas

Business continuity is very important to our business, and as our team witnessed, it is essential to have effective Planning and Preparedness in place.

When we created our business continuity plans, we followed the Accenture Delivery Methodology that considers people, workplace and technology systems along with securing the critical assets to continue services.

The two major aspects of planning in business continuity aim to address the following key areas:

• Understand the business requirements that are critical to continue, identify and assess risks and apply controls to manage them at an acceptable level.
• Develop strategies to support the business requirements to limit the disruption to services if it occurs.

Our team applied appropriate solutions at different stages of the situation. They evaluated the level of disruption and responded accordingly.

Did you know that disruptions are categorized into four levels!

Let’s take a quick look at the four levels.

Level 1: A partial failure of services that does not require relocation or recovery to other sites
Level 2: Failure of a production location that requires relocation of services to other sites
Level 3: Failure of a city service that requires relocation of services to another city
Level 4: Failure of a country service that requires relocation of services to another country

The standard level of planning addresses level 1 and level 2. If clients require enhanced levels of planning, it is done by working closely with the clients to get the right plan to support critical processes.

Now, we truly understand the saying:

“If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail!” (Benjamin Franklin)

1.6 Did You Know?

Accenture’s Infectious Disease Planning is also integrated into the
crisis management and business continuity programs to provide a joint
approach to any large scale event.

1.7 We Plan as disasters do happen!

So with all the theory, do we actually use the plans we prepare, exercise and train for?

Well, in 2015, Accenture faced a number of challenging events that covered safety, security and business disruption outcomes.

During the monsoon season in Chennai (India), heavy rains, in two separate events, led to the closure of Accenture delivery centers. From a continuity planning point of view, the extreme floods pushed the plans to a breaking point.

The impact to operations was significant, as our people, facilities and technology were all impacted at the same time.

Over the two events, the continuity plans were activated to maintain critical services. When the weather permitted and people were available, the plan to relocate over 2,000 people to other parts of India to set up a recovery of the services was initiated. A big cleanup progressed to reopen the flooded facilities, and several recovery teams were deployed across India. In addition to the local recovery, remote support was provided from across Manila, Europe and the US to support the critical services.

Apart from planning, the next thing that helps us in the moment is ‘Preparedness.’

Preparedness is priceless and goes beyond just creating a documented plan. The funny thing about preparedness is that it seems unnecessary under normal conditions, but without preparedness, we'll feel paralyzed during a crisis.

Some key points that are part of your preparation are:

• Who to contact if there is an emergency: There will be several channels available to you depending on your location or plans agreed to. If in doubt, you can reach out to your supervisor or contact the Accenture Security Operations Center (ASOC).
• What to do if your office is closed: Depending on your continuity plan, if your office is closed, then you may need to report to an alternative location.
• Following emergency processes: Understand your location’s emergency processes that could cover anything from local first aid situations, earthquake events, bomb threats and an emergency evacuation.

So, how do we prepare?

We need to actively take part in the business continuity activities.

The business continuity program:

• Provides an online training program.
• Conducts online awareness activities that include the use of collaboration tools. Some locations run awareness weeks. Watch for activities in your location or business area, and be aware.
• Conducts additional trainings (for some roles) to support planning and preparedness.
• Exercises the continuity plans annually.

I'm sure you'll agree that applying the awareness is what gives us the confidence on how to handle a business disruption. When we exercise, we practice how the plan would work in a real emergency. The exercise could include actual relocation of services to different locations, set up of technology or a basic walkthrough of the plan with the recovery team.

So, don't wait for a crisis to happen. Just watch for business activities in your location or business area, and be business continuity aware.

1.8 Tips to Remember

So, what should you and I really do?

Take some really simple steps!

• Ensure that your emergency contact details are updated in the people directory.
  Visit myrequests@accenture.com to update the information.
  Know the emergency, security and safety processes for your location.
• Contact your supervisor or the ASOC during an emergency.
• Ensure that you know the business continuity plan for your team before you actually need to use it.

And, always remember:

• Don’t communicate outside of Accenture to a client or media unless you are authorized to do so.

Well, now that we have gone through the salient aspects of business continuity and your role in driving it, let us move on to a short knowledge check.