Free Business Continuity Policy Builder

1. Purpose

We need a plan to keep the business running when bad things happen—natural disasters, cyberattacks, major outages, or other crises. This policy ensures we can recover quickly, protect our customers, and satisfy SOC 2 requirements.

2. Scope

Covers all critical business functions, essential personnel, key systems, and recovery procedures needed to maintain operations during a disruption. Applies to all departments and includes both technology recovery (Disaster Recovery) and business process recovery (Business Continuity).

3. Roles

• Chief Operations Officer (COO) – owns this policy, approves the Business Continuity Plan, activates recovery procedures
• Business Continuity Manager – maintains the BCP, coordinates testing, updates documentation
• Crisis Management Team – makes decisions during incidents, coordinates response and recovery
• Department Heads – define critical functions for their areas, identify dependencies, participate in testing
• IT/Infrastructure Team – executes disaster recovery procedures, restores systems and data

4. Core Principles

• Life safety first – protect people before systems or data
• Customer impact minimization – prioritize customer-facing services
• Clear communication – keep stakeholders informed throughout recovery
• Regular testing – test plans annually to ensure they work when needed

5. Business Continuity Plan (BCP)

The Business Continuity Plan documents how we'll respond to and recover from disruptions. The BCP includes:

• Incident Classification: Severity levels (Minor, Major, Critical) with activation criteria
• Emergency Response Procedures: Immediate actions to ensure safety and contain damage
• Crisis Management Structure: Decision-making team and communication protocols
• Critical Business Functions: Prioritized list of essential operations and their dependencies
• Recovery Procedures: Step-by-step instructions for restoring each critical function
• Communication Plans: Internal and external notification procedures
• Contact Information: Emergency contacts, vendors, key personnel

6. Business Impact Analysis (BIA)

We conduct a Business Impact Analysis annually to:

• Identify critical business functions and processes
• Determine Maximum Tolerable Downtime (MTD) for each function
• Assess financial, operational, and reputational impact of disruptions
• Identify dependencies (people, systems, vendors, facilities)
• Establish recovery priorities based on business impact
• Define Recovery Time Objectives (RTO) and Recovery Point Objectives (RPO)

BIA Update Schedule: Annually, or when significant business changes occur

7. Recovery Objectives

Tier 1: Critical Functions (RTO: 4 hours, RPO: 1 hour)

• Customer-facing production systems and APIs
• Payment processing and financial transactions
• Authentication and authorization services
• Customer support ticketing and communication

Tier 2: Essential Functions (RTO: 24 hours, RPO: 4 hours)

• Internal business applications and tools
• Email and collaboration platforms
• Reporting and analytics systems
• Vendor management and procurement

Tier 3: Standard Functions (RTO: 72 hours, RPO: 24 hours)

• Development and staging environments
• Internal documentation and knowledge bases
• Non-critical business processes

8. Disaster Recovery (DR)

Disaster Recovery focuses on restoring IT systems and infrastructure:

• DR Site: Cloud-based recovery infrastructure in geographically separate region
• Failover Procedures: Documented steps to switch to DR environment
• Data Recovery: Restore from backups following Backup Management Policy
• System Restoration Priority: Follows business function criticality (Tier 1 → Tier 2 → Tier 3)
• Network Connectivity: VPN and network configuration for DR site access
• Application Dependencies: Documented startup order and configuration

9. Crisis Management Team

The Crisis Management Team (CMT) leads response and recovery efforts:

• Incident Commander: COO or designated executive (overall authority)
• Operations Lead: Infrastructure/IT Director (technical recovery)
• Communications Lead: Marketing/PR Director (internal and external communications)
• Business Lead: Department heads for affected functions
• Legal/Compliance: General Counsel (regulatory notifications, legal issues)

Activation: CMT is activated when a Major or Critical incident is declared

10. Communication Protocols

Internal Communication

• Primary: Slack emergency channel
• Secondary: Email to all@company.com
• Backup: SMS to emergency contact list
• Status updates every 2 hours during active incident

External Communication

• Customers: Status page updates, email notifications for major incidents
• Vendors: Direct contact via emergency contact list
• Regulatory Bodies: Notifications per compliance requirements (within 72 hours for data breaches)
• Media: All media inquiries directed to Communications Lead

11. Continuity Testing

We test our Business Continuity Plan at least annually:

• Tabletop Exercises: Quarterly discussion-based scenarios with CMT
• Disaster Recovery Drills: Annual technical failover test to DR environment
• Full-Scale Simulation: Annual comprehensive test involving all stakeholders
• Post-Test Review: Document lessons learned, update procedures, track corrective actions
• Test Documentation: Record test date, participants, scenarios, results, and improvements

Test Success Criteria: Meet defined RTO/RPO objectives, successful stakeholder communication, effective decision-making

12. Plan Maintenance

• Annual Review: Full BCP review and update by COO and Business Continuity Manager
• Quarterly Updates: Contact information, personnel changes, vendor updates
• Change-Triggered Updates: Material changes to business operations, infrastructure, or risks
• Version Control: All plan versions retained for 3 years
• Distribution: Current BCP accessible to all Crisis Management Team members

13. Alternative Work Arrangements

For facility-related disruptions:

• Remote Work: All employees equipped for remote work (primary strategy)
• Alternative Workspace: Co-working space agreements for extended outages
• Work-from-Home Equipment: Laptops, VPN access, collaboration tools
• Equipment Distribution: Process for providing equipment to employees without home setups

14. Vendor and Third-Party Dependencies

• Critical vendor list maintained with emergency contacts and SLAs
• Vendor continuity plans reviewed during procurement and annually thereafter
• Alternative vendors identified for single-source dependencies
• Vendor recovery coordination procedures documented in BCP

15. Insurance and Financial Continuity

• Business interruption insurance coverage reviewed annually
• Cyber insurance for security incident recovery costs
• Emergency funds accessible for immediate recovery expenses
• Financial impact assessment included in post-incident review

16. Training and Awareness

• All employees complete annual business continuity awareness training
• Crisis Management Team receives specialized incident response training
• New employees receive BCP overview during onboarding
• Department-specific recovery procedures training for key personnel

17. Exceptions

Exceptions to this policy require COO approval with documented business justification and compensating controls.

18. Enforcement

Failure to participate in continuity testing or maintain recovery documentation may result in management review.

19. References

• SOC 2 – Business Continuity and Availability Controls
• [Your Company] Information Security Policy
• [Your Company] Disaster Recovery Plan
• [Your Company] Backup Management Policy
• [Your Company] Incident Response Plan
• [Your Company] Crisis Communication Plan

20. Revision History

Date	Version	Author	Description
[Date]	1.0	Chief Operations Officer	Initial release