The ongoing COVID-19 outbreak has forced businesses around the world to change the way they function. Cities continue to unpredictably be placed under complete, partial and spurts of localised lockdowns. Lack of accessibility to physical locations is a key reason behind businesses moving to an online model both internally and externally. This ‘Social Distancing’ facet of COVID-19 has propelled many organizations to redefine their work culture from personal to remote and digital to ensure business continuity.
Many organisations have been successful in allowing remote access to core systems. This has allowed many external facing functions to carry out their tasks from home or on-the-move. When working in a digital workspace, access to documented resources such as manuals and policies for compliance and adherence to processes increases in importance. Pre COVID, we would often see people in the workplace consulting a more experienced colleague who would come by their side to see them through a particularly tricky case and sequence of steps. Unfortunately, remote working limits the possibilities for quick access to your more experienced colleague at the adjoining desk.
Problems further arise when the information is available in digital form. This pertains to the way the information is indexed and structured so that it is quick and easy to find, availability of FAQ’s, related training material, frequency of updates, and infrastructure related speed of access.
When creating a Business Continuity Plan (BCP), strongly consider digitizing your policies, procedures, operating manuals and compliance information. Keep them centralized and it doesn’t matter if this server is located within your Organisation’s data centre or somewhere on the internet, as long as they can be accessed remotely. In either case it is a private or public ‘cloud’. Index and structure the information, add short videos, add FAQ’s to make the specific information quick and easy to find and keep this updated. Keep the information secure and tamper-proof. This makes enterprise-wide information available instantly in case of a business disruption.
In these difficult times when there is external uncertainty, internal stability helps to ensure compliance and be resilient despite the turbulence.
Internal stability can be achieved by defining a clear decision-making process for real responses, collaboration across all business units, and seamless support from an effective Business Continuity Management (BCM) solution.
At Total RegTech Solutions, we help businesses formulate, test, and execute their business continuity plans, through a combination of Business Advisory Services, Training and Software Solutions. Visit us at www.totalregtechsolutions.com or Call +973 1700 3357 / WhatsApp +973 36710 300