Legally Speaking: Spring Cleaning of a Different Variety

Every year many of us go through the usual spring cleaning routine including tasks like sweeping out the garage, rotating your wardrobe, and prepping outdoor furniture, among others. Michigan Retailers Association engages in a different sort of annual spring cleaning: making sure that we’re fully prepared to maintain business continuity in the event of a disaster, whether it be cyber, natural, flooding, fire, epidemic, or otherwise. Doing the same will save you time, money, and may even save your business if an unfortunate event occurs.

MRA’s annual disaster recovery exercise simulates an event where our operations have been fully interrupted. It outlines the restoration process in such detail that any recovery team member can restore operations in a relatively short time. We focus on four distinct areas; facilities, information technology, communications, and overall management, while maintaining some overlap for shared responsibility.

When developing a disaster recovery plan for your business, several critical priorities should shape your efforts, with employee and customer safety being first. While predicting a disaster is impossible, preparation is not. Take care to ensure that every safety measure is up to date.

Once safety measures have been attended to, the next priority for most businesses will be information technology (IT). Back-up systems and protections against cyber-attacks are at the top of issues related to IT security. At MRA, we back up our systems regularly and store those backups offsite. Each year, our group goes through an exercise to access the back-up system. We also maintain extensive security precautions to prevent cyber attacks, including multi-factor authentication, employee training, phishing tests, penetration testing, and professional consultation.