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Don't Compound Disasters During Flu Season
Bare Metal Restore, Remote Backup and Pandemic Flu
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Well, here we are at the beginning of another Flu Season – this time with the threat of Pandemic Flu. While the media has been quiet on the subject lately, businesses and government agencies have been working hard behind the scenes.
Experts are saying that should a Pandemic occur, businesses should expect 30 to 40 percent absentee rates. Few experts mention the fact that many healthy people may choose to work from home (and hopefully avoid exposure), but this is something that we are urging businesses to consider.
Sick people make bad workers, and one of your organization’s goals should be to help people stay healthy. Consider allowing employees to work from home in the midst of a bona fide Pandemic. One way to do this is to provide VPN access to critical systems, but VPN only goes so far.
We are recommending that companies update their Disaster Recovery Plans to identify key employees who would be able to work from home, and then identify which data and/or applications they will need to do their work. Some may simply need access to data, but others may need programs installed (and the associated registry / system state information) it will be necessary to implement a Bare Metal Restore (BMR). Most people think about Bare Metal Restore operations for servers, but there is nothing to prevent implementing the procedure on a desktop. Of course, if you are not currently taking advantage of an online backup service, you will need to implement one to make this plan effective.
A BMR is a relatively simple operation that makes a complete copy of a system – including the registry, operating system, all patches, all files, and all programs – exactly as they exist. The BMR is then kept up to date with day-to-day changes (via online backup), and in the event the computer is lost or destroyed, a simple restore will provide the ability to keep working without the associated nightmare of rebuilding a system. The technology even allows for the restore to be done to a different manufacturer’s computer – with the only requirement being that the motherboard be compatible between the two machines.
By implementing a BMR, all workers (healthy or not) would have the ability to work from home – and keep infection to a minimum, and business continuity to a maximum.
So how do you prepare?
- Appoint a pandemic coordinator to update your business continuity plan – determining key employees and what they would need to work from home.
- Set and implement policy for automated online backups to capture information in a way that it can be restored via the Internet vault to the employee’s home.
- Take inventory of computers that may be used as backup computers for home-bound workers, and consider purchasing additional desktop machines for use in case of emergency.
- Consider placing any extra computers purchased in the step above into non-critical service – maximizing the investment return on Disaster Recovery spending
- Test the plan regularly, and make sure it is up to date.
Additional information can be found at the following links:
Author Robert F. Gerace is the President and founder of CRC
