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ready for any eventuality

When Gonu struck on June 6, BankMuscat was among the few companies here that had a solid disaster recovery plan
BusinessToday reports

The terrorist attack on the World Trade Centre taught us much about disaster recovery. The problem, however, is that few businesses, even those in the US, acted on what they learned because another terrorist attack of that scale was considered unlikely. So when Hurricane Katrina struck, not as many businesses as you would have expected had strong business continuity planning (BCP) in place.

In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, many businesses scrambled to update their disaster recovery plans. Unfortunately, a second hurricane, Rita, was bearing down on them just as they had begun assessing the damage. While Rita didn't cause the kind of damage that Katrina did, it provided a cautionary tale: it is no longer enough to prepare for one disaster, since a second could be right behind it.

In Oman, BCP, as a business strategy, is yet to catch up. When the sultanate was hit by Cyclone Gonu on June 6, BankMuscat was among the few companies that had a solid disaster recovery plan. The bank had appointed internationally renowned BCP experts, Insight Consulting Limited, UK to help them set up a robust BCP programme in 2003.

Speaking on the importance of the BCP initiative, AbdulRazak Ali Issa, chief executive, BankMuscat had then said, "Business continuity planning is of paramount significance in today's business scenario and is crucial to managing institutional and systemic risks. The BCP process requires continuous review and upgrading to keep pace with the dynamic and ever changing business environment that the bank operates in."

This process was put to the test this time around with the bank's BCP committee meeting in a proactive 'war-room' situation before the onset of Cyclone Gonu to activate the bank's crisis management plans and meeting regularly after the cyclone to review the situation at hand and ensure uninterrupted service to customers nationwide.
Explaining the rationale behind this initiative and the level of preparations of the bank, Said al Badai, BCP committee chairman of BankMuscat, says, "Forward planning is the key to success in recovering from a crisis and thanks to our BCP process we had a recovery plan in place. Even before the cyclone hit the sultanate, we worked in teams on various scenarios, so that we were prepared for the worst. Once the cyclone's impact on the sultanate was known, we assessed its impact and invoked the bank's crisis management plan based on the assessment. As part of the process, we reached out to people �within the organisation and to our customers nationwide �to advise them of the preparations we had made. And though we were impacted by power and data connectivity failure, we managed to reach out and serve our customers across the network. Thanks to the excellent support and cooperation we received from Omantel and the ministries concerned, we were able to recover rapidly."

The bank's efforts in this direction seem to have paid off. A couple of days after Gonu, BankMuscat was already up and running. Says Badai, "Substantial progress has been made in restoring normal operations across our branches and ATM network across the sultanate. As of now, 95 of our total 100 branches are providing full-scale service to our customers. A total of 171 of our 233 ATMs are also serving the needs of customers. Our call centre and Internet banking facilities are also providing customers the full range of services.�br>
The bank's Data Recovery Centre (DRC) in MBD South, which is always kept in an advanced state of readiness, was also pressed into service with the bank's Baituna office in the Qurm commercial complex area being severely damaged. "Our Baituna operations, though affected by the floods, has been up and running from the first day that all of us came back to work."

BCP looks at ways and means to equip an organisation deal with a variety of crises that may come its way, both from economic and natural reasons. It looks not only at providing organisations with the right set of tools and response mechanisms but also at identifying key procedures that will help protect it.