Business Continuity Awareness Week (BCAW) is a global event designed to raise awareness of business continuity and resilience by educating, sharing experiences, knowledge and best practices.

This year, BCAW 2021 will run from 17th – 21st May 2021, and celebrates the theme, “Business continuity starts with you”. Why this theme? The pandemic has demonstrated that business continuity is not just a ‘plan’; it is a process, a collaborative discipline that involves everyone in a team and within an organisation – and not just one individual. Business continuity starts with each member of staff, from top to bottom.

Don’t let the coronavirus pandemic get in your way. You are resilient right? Be creative. What will you do to raise awareness of business continuity and the importance of resilience?

Here is our list of 8 things you can do during BCAW 2021 to help improve the level of engagement in resilience and business continuity management:

• Update your organisations Business Impact Analysis (BIAs) via on-line meetings.
• Review and update key elements of your response plans such as the BCP, Crisis Management Plan, Pandemic Plan, IT-DRP or Data Breach Response Plan.
• During the pandemic, many employees are working from home and this increases cyber risks.  Conduct on-line cyber security awareness training sessions.
• With climate risk and third party risks on the rise, conduct a Crisis Management Team simulation exercise covering one of these risks.
• Conduct refresher training for the Crisis Team and senior managers involved in implementing your response plans.
• Provide management a high level presentation covering the concept of operation of the various response plans.
• Run on-line games and quizzes such as crosswords and find a word.
• How creative are your people? Run a competition and have people draw a picture or write a short poem on what ‘Business continuity starts with you’ means to them.

InConsult encourages all organisations to get involved in Business Continuity Awareness Week 2021.  Contact us if you would like help in planning or conducting events during BCAW 2021.

Find out more about BCAW 2021 at the Business Continuity Institute’s website.

Remember that whatever you do, it’s all about keeping business continuity front of mind and staff aware of your organisations response strategy! Check out InConsult’s Business Continuity Management capabilities to find out how we can help you build a more resilient organisation.