Necessity of ISO 22301

Many companies don't consider their business continuity plans to be an essential component of how they run their daily operations, but rather merely a series of checklists and processes to follow in an emergency. Businesses that obstinately hold on to these beliefs are never able to fully realize the benefits of their BCMS (Business Continuity Management Systems) in terms of increased operational and financial performance or improved brand reputation. To assist firms in overcoming this obstacle, a number of frameworks are available, including ISO 22301:2012. The implementation of ISO 22301:2012, a standard for managing, mitigating, and recovering from disruptive incidents, either alone or in conjunction with other management systems like ISO 9001 (Quality), ISO 27001 (Information Security), ISO 14001 (Environment), or ISO 45001 (Occupational Health & Safety), can have a number of beneficial effects for organizations of all sizes and across all sectors. For every firm that wishes to safeguard its operations from any type of disruption, accreditation to ISO 22301, the global standard for business continuity planning and response, is a need.

The legal, regulatory, organizational, and industry factors, the products and services, the size and structure of the organization, the processes it uses, and its stakeholders are all important considerations in the design of an effective Business Continuity Management System (BCMS) that ISO 22301 can help an organization implement. Several nations, including the UK and Singapore, have accepted this standard in place of their previous national norms. Fire, flood, and harsh weather are only a few examples of disasters that can occur at any moment. Other examples include robbery, IT failure, natural catastrophe, personnel illness, and terrorist attack and acts of terrorism. Natural catastrophes, human error, and random chance all contribute to the probability of adverse events, but this does not make them any less severe. The ISO 22301 management system is useful for identifying potential risks to your organization and preventing disruptions to mission-critical processes. A company must be compliant with the ISO 22301:2012 standard in order to be certified, but that doesn't mean it will be able to handle a crisis well. Requirements, policies, objectives, performance, and actions may all be better connected with the help of the process method. Company and management of business continuity operations that add value to an organisation and its stakeholders may be achieved via the use of a process approach. Consequently, a process approach for business continuity may help a company see how each phase contributes to the overall goals of surviving and thriving after a disruptive occurrence, allowing it to immediately identify problematic spots in conducting the process. The standard specifies that a BCMS have mechanisms, stored as recorded information, to systematically identify continuity and recovery priorities, and specify objectives and goals to be accomplished, in terms of minimal acceptable performance and time to achieve them. Priorities, objectives, and goals should be established in light of the impact that prospective disruptive events may have on the organization's operations, resources, and dependencies in the course of delivering its goods and services. In order to back-up a business impact analysis, a BCMS should have a documented risk assessment procedure in place to help discover, analyse, evaluate, and treat risks that might cause disruptive circumstances. Business continuity goals and the organization's risk tolerance must inform the evaluation and handling of risks. The results of a business continuity analysis should inform the organization's approach to outlining a business continuity strategy that accounts for the mitigation, reaction, and management of effects as well as the protection, stability, continuity, restart, and recovery of key operations. Interdependencies and available support mechanisms must be taken into account during the business continuity strategy formulation and selection processes. Organizations need to develop, execute, and maintain documented business continuity policies to guarantee that their operations can continue as normal and that incidents are handled in a way that meets the recovery objectives established in the business impact analysis. The processes need to detail how the information will be shared with the public and amongst employees in the event of a disruption, as well as what steps will be done to mitigate the effects of the interruption. They must also be adaptable enough to deal with sudden shifts in internal and external threats. ISO 22301:2012 stipulates that in the event of a disruption, an organization must have in place procedures and people with the authority and competence to manage incidents, taking into account incident identification, impact nature, and extension evaluation. In addition to this, it also includes the activation of proper continuity response and communications with relevant interested parties.

In the event of a disruption, ISO 22301 compiles worldwide best practices to aid enterprises in responding to the situation and recovering as quickly and cheaply as possible. Organizational size and type are both irrelevant to this benchmark. Everyone interested in a BCMS's creation, upkeep, and enhancement is included. Its secondary goal is to make sure the BCMS is being used to its full potential, which means making sure it's being used to make sure that businesses are resilient and complying with their declared business continuity policies. In addition, you should work to foster an attitude of readiness.

A variety of factors, such as roles, duties, and authority, should be addressed in the business continuity plan. Work like this must be done both during and after a traumatic event; simply surviving is not enough. The procedures for restarting and resuming operations after an interruption caused by an incident must be documented in a BCMS in accordance with ISO 22301. It means meeting or exceeding the predetermined benchmarks for performance in a "business as usual," or baseline, scenario. With the purpose of ensuring the continued viability of the business, ISO 22301 offers advice on how to handle, lessen, and recover from disruptive situations. Accreditation and compliance are advantageous to an organisation in many ways, including in terms of reputation, employee morale, and bottom-line profits, so it makes sense that a thorough understanding of these standards would be advantageous. With the supply chain strengthened, the company can better assure its clientele that it will meet or exceed its performance expectations for the supplied goods and services. A company's long-term viability depends on its ability to provide excellent customer service, meet the needs of its internal and external stakeholders, and prevent any threats to its ability to do business.

SIS Certifications is among the most reputable and reliable certification bodies that offer international management system certification to all types of organizations, irrespective of their type, size, and processes, using the right processes. They are certified by the International Accreditation Services (IAS) and the International Organization for Accreditation Services (IOAS). Hence, if you need assistance with any kind of ISO certification in Nigeria, please contact us: [email protected]

Written by: Lokesh Sharma (Sales & Marketing Manager)

Edited by: Varun Verma

SIS Certifications Pvt Ltd