| In late 2008, Symantec Corp. released the global | | | | survey, 55 percent of respondents said that their |
| results of its fourth annual IT Disaster Recovery | | | | DR committees involved the CIO, CTO or IT |
| survey, which demonstrates a significant decline in | | | | director. However, in 2008 that number dropped |
| executive involvement in disaster recovery | | | | to 33 percent worldwide. Symantec believes that |
| planning and a significant increase in the number of | | | | such a move is a troubling trend, particularly in |
| organizations reevaluating their disaster recovery | | | | light of the mission critical applications not currently |
| (DR) plans. | | | | covered in DR plans and the reevaluation of plans |
| Disaster recovery plans are not documents | | | | due to virtualization. Increased executive |
| collecting dust on shelves. In the past year, | | | | involvement has been shown to increase the |
| one-third of organizations surveyed had to | | | | success of DR plans. |
| execute their disaster recovery plans due to a | | | | From my point of view, I couldn't agree more |
| variety of factors including: Hardware and | | | | with Symantec that C-level involvement is a |
| software failure (36 percent of organizations); | | | | necessity in DR planning. Our experience shows |
| external security threats (28 percent of | | | | that when C-level decision makers are involved in |
| organizations); power outage/failure/issues (26 | | | | DR planning - from authorizing the action to |
| percent of organizations); natural disasters (23 | | | | assuring that senior management stays involved - |
| percent of organizations); IT problem | | | | the plan has a much higher rate of success and |
| management (23 percent of organizations); data | | | | implementation. |
| leakage or loss (22 percent of organizations); and | | | | Considering the intensity of the past few |
| accidental or malicious employee behavior (21 | | | | hurricane seasons and the severe winter weather |
| percent of organizations). Given the regularity of | | | | so far, I believe businesses have plenty of |
| events that cause downtime, IT organizations | | | | incentive to plan for disasters and business |
| should expect that their DR plans will be tested at | | | | disruptions. Don't wait until disaster strikes. Get |
| some point in the future. | | | | your disaster recovery plan done and |
| Survey results also indicate that C-level | | | | implemented today. |
| involvement in DR planning is declining. In the 2007 | | | | |