White Paper: 11 Questions About Your Crisis-Response Plan
What is our standard telecommunications bandwidth capacity, and will it be sufficient if we redeploy all remote-capable positions in a crisis? If your bandwidth cannot support large-scale remote work, your telecom manager will need to invest in backup capacity, which is a different kind of business relationship with your internet service provider (ISP). You may need to find a different ISP.
How many telecommunication access points do we have into our IT network? Some redundancy is essential, in case you lose your primary access point for reasons beyond your control. The best data system in the world is useless, if it’s not accessible.
How well can we manage our data centers remotely? IT staff are affected by crises just like the rest of the organization, but remote management of servers and data centers is routinely available today. However, few organizations make full use of remote management, so you should ask.
Do our data systems have adequate backup power to support them through an extended power outage? Can the power systems also be managed remotely? If the redeployment is due to a storm or other natural disaster, don’t count on power from utilities.
Is our data backed up frequently, securely and accessibly, regardless of where it originates or resides? Beyond ordinary data-recovery concerns, a mass redeployment risks dispersion of important information across many remote desktops and laptops. Even under normal operations, your organization should ensure that data resides only where it belongs, and your redeployment plan should as well.
What remote-access technology does your organization use – a Virtual Private Network (VPN), dial-up or other – and will it scale up sufficiently, when you activate your redeployment plan in a crisis? What’s adequate for normal operations may fail, if the number of users increases significantly and suddenly.
How can we deploy sufficient remote or mobile computing devices to support redeployment during a crisis without spending exorbitant amounts of money? Consider the options, which include rapid-provisioning contracts with a trusted vendor, routine assignment of laptops to some functions, limited provision of home desktops or thin client devices and authorization of secure remote access to your network from selected, employee-owned home computers. As your organization replaces employee computers routinely, you can increase capabilities for immediate and seamless redeployment.
What remote access security tools do we use, and will they also scale sufficiently in a crisis? How will you deploy expanded remote-access security on short notice without creating a bottleneck and losing productivity? Consider differences between security practices within your network and for remote access and eliminate them if possible. Don’t expect practices that are unfamiliar to employees to work well under pressure.
If you appreciated this article and want to receive more valuable industry content like this, click here to sign up for our FREE digital newsletters!
Leading in Turbulent Times: Effective Campus Public Safety Leadership for the 21st Century 
