DRP: the job is not done until the paperwork is done

The job is not done until the paperwork is done.

Nowhere is this pithy saying more true than in disaster recovery planning. Why? Because the paperwork in DRP is about how to jump-start the business when “the big one” hits. Depending upon where your business is located, the “big one” may be an earthquake, tornado, hurricane, flood, or a swarm of locusts.

The paperwork in DRP is simply this: the procedures and other documents that business personnel must refer to in order to get things going again after a disaster. The DRP procedures are especially important because they might be read and followed by persons who are not the foremost experts with the systems that support critical business processes. Still, those people are expected to rebuild critical systems in a short period of time in order to support critical process that are probably going to be performed by people who likewise are not subject matter experts at the business process level.

And the business’s survival depends on the paperwork being right. There are no second chances.

You just love documentation, right? Thought so.

– from IT Disaster Recovery Planning for Dummies