Corporate Canada poorly prepared for business disasters

Almost half of corporate Canada has faced disasters including power outage or IT failure but almost 75% rely on an “unofficial” business continuity plan, according to a recent report conducted by Leger Marketing for hosted services company Fusepoint Managed Services.
The report says 50% of surveyed companies that have a disaster recovery plan would qualify it as”full-blown,” while almost one in three firms only operate on an “unofficial” recovery program. Phone tree is the primary means of continuing business in the instance of a disaster for 12% of companies surveyed, according to the report.
In addition, the survey says 40 % of the 520 business executives interviewed say they have not devoted any finances towards a disaster recovery program in the last five years, while 80% claim to have spent less than (CD)$100,000.
The majority of executives at 46% interviewed say IT disaster is the biggest perceived threat to the workplace. Following behind where issues such as fire or theft, internal employee error, infrastructure disaster and natural disaster. A pandemic was the lowest on the list of executive concerns, while 25% considered it to be their greatest threat.
Despite the lack of a business continuity plan among most executives interviewed, 33% felt “very responsible” for their company’s disaster preparedness.