IM Solutions is an IT company based in Western Australia that hosts servers for 100 clients. On October 31st, 2021, lightning struck their office building, causing a fire to break out.

The fire severely damaged the company's office space, melting cables, office equipment and burning its computer hardware. IM 's entire infrastructure was destroyed.

Prior to the disaster, William Green had already established the following continuity objectives:

The importance to move its client servers to a remote data centre, where continual backups are stored

The requirement is that clients would never experience an interruption in service.

The stakeholders are:

The company's founder William Green

The business manager, the IT Executive, and the HR manager

The employees (15 in total).

The stakeholders' main expectation is:

To implement a disaster strategy that would recognise that it would only take one major on-site disruption to wipe out the entire business, as well as the clients' businesses, potentially leaving them exposed to legal liabilities as well.

The resources required:

IT system that supports critical functions

Software for backup and disaster recovery

IT Executive with specialised knowledge for disaster recovery.

Organisational policies and procedures:

Training on disaster procedures for all staff and updated annually

A copy of disaster preparedness accessible shared document folder.

Emergency response, continuity, and recovery strategies

The company's founder William Green actioned the company's continuity plan with immediate effect, and the staff was quickly relocated to a temporary office to resume the company's normal operations.

Critical business functions relating to disaster management:

The company's CEO, William Green, has included the requirement of reciprocal interdependence. This means that each task performed during the disaster management should be executed in accordance with the other tasks associated with it.

Refer to Case Study A - IM Solutions

1. What is the main source of disruption for the company?

1. In your own words, briefly explain what the organisation's main priorities are.

1. Explain how the company's operations and environment will be affected.

explain how the company has responded to the emergency, including their plan for continuity and recovery strategies.

Refer to Case Study A - IM Solutions

1. In relation to the events in the case study, identify the company's critical business function.
2. Briefly explain what dependencies and interdependencies are for the company in relation to its critical business function.
3. Identify one risk and disruption scenario that the company could experience during the implementation of their continuity plan.

Case Study B - Pandemic requirements

Cameo's Italian restaurant is an established, successful business based in Queensland, Australia.

The stakeholders are Martin, the restaurant owner, Martin's sister Antonio and brother Austin who are the main investors, and the restaurant's 22 employees.

The restaurant has recently received notification that they will have to close again with immediate effect due to a second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Martin will need to implement his continuity plan for the second time to protect his restaurant's future.

His plan already consists of the following information:

• To regularly check Government and industry pandemic requirements, standards, industry practice, and geographical dispersion relating to the pandemic
• To establish the virtual communication plan with his staff to ensure communication is open at all times to discuss issues, explain procedures, and escalate issues if necessary
• To consult and develop the disaster recovery plan with his relevant stakeholders and seek feedback
• To assign relevant staff actions to implement business continuity plan - turn the restaurant into a takeaway
• To refresh staff training to implement the business continuity plan and the organisation's virtual knowledge management system.

Refer to the Case Study and outline a business management framework for Martin to ensure the future of his restaurant. Include the following points:

• What guidelines will he need to follow
• How he can keep communication open for his staff
• What he can do to keep the restaurant in business
• How he can ensure the business can continue regular service.

Refer to the Case Study and identify one risk associated with the business continuity management framework and assess the nature of this risk. In answer, consider the following:

• The likelihood of the risk occurring
• The consequences of the risk
• Potential control measures.

Refer to Case Study B - Pandemic requirements

Using the risk that you identified, lead a meeting with the stakeholders to report the risk and seek feedback on ways to improve your continuity management framework.

• State the risk that you have identified
• Discuss and determine two ways in which the risk can be managed and improve the continuity management framework.

Assess the implementation of the risk mitigation identified in the restaurant's continuity framework.

Produce a report for a meeting with stakeholders that analyses and validates your business impact assessment. Include:

• An analysis of your two chosen risk mitigation solutions
• Validate by explaining how this would impact the business in a positive way.

Refer to Case Study B - Pandemic requirements

Using the report that you have created in the previous activity, lead a discussion with relevant stakeholders to complete the following tasks:

• Share your analysis of your two chosen risk mitigation solutions
• Explain how this would impact the business in a positive way
• Seek feedback from the stakeholders.

Explain how you can implement the risk treatments you have identified in previous activities and develop a plan on how they will be managed.