A Message from John Applegate
Executive Vice President for University Regional Affairs, Planning, & Policy

RE: Business Continuity

Dear Colleagues -

In recent years, each of us has witnessed other colleges and universities experience catastrophic events, natural and manmade, large and small.  Likewise, many IU campuses have had first-hand experience with natural, technological, and human incidents ranging from floods and ice storms, to fires and pandemic influenza.  IU, through an Emergency Management and Higher Education (EMHE) grant from the U.S. Department of Education, has the opportunity to engage in planning initiatives that will attempt to answer the “What if’s….” that occur in all such incidents.

Business continuity planning is an important aspect of emergency preparedness, and each department or unit on all IU campuses will be asked to develop a business continuity plan to address the challenges to conducting their department's or unit’s business during or after an emergency. (“Business” is a universal term that includes all operations, whether they are academic, research, or the business of the university.)   That is, working in advance to answer questions like “If my current office areas are decimated by fire, where and how will I resume my operations?”

The USDOE grant covers the Bloomington and regional campuses; IUPUI received a previous grant, and continuity planning at IUPUI is already well underway.

In the next few weeks, members of the Business Continuity Planning (BCP) team will be contacting departments and units on your campuses or in your offices, with detailed information about what is needed and what the activity entails. If you are interested in a preview, a description of IU’s process can be found within these Business Continuity pages.

I am writing to make sure you know about this initiative, and to request that you support this important activity by encouraging your staff to work with the BCP team. Your support is essential to the success of the BCP initiative, and IU will be a better-prepared institution when the plans are completed and are being maintained.

Please feel free to contact Mark Bruhn or me with any questions or concerns.

John S. Applegate
Executive Vice President for University
Regional Affairs, Planning, and Policy

Business Continuity Planning is the practice of planning how you will run your service or business unit processes when normal operating procedures are not possible. If you do not have access to computers, how will you continue processing your business information? In addition, once computers are restored, how will you bring the system to a current status?

The first step in creating a solid Business Continuity Plan for any service would be to define all of the business processes and their dependencies on system and human resources. A general guide is available to assist you with the questions that need to be answered to better prepare you for an IT disaster or a localized incident in your workspace.

All University departments should develop a Business Continuity Plan for their business processes.

How we can help

Our charge in the Business Continuity Program is to assist you in developing your plan by:

• Providing a web accessible tool for creating, storing & maintaining plan(s)
• Being ready and available to advise and direct every phase of the BCP development process necessary
• Providing resources to assist with each phase
• Providing system-wide answers to common problems or questions
• Assisting with BCP testing; maintenance & best practice resources

Please do not hesitate to contact IU Emergency Management and Continuity as the need arises.