Difference Between BCP and DR (With Table)

The terms Business Continuity Planning (BCP) and Disaster Recovery (DR) are both techniques used and are employed to mitigate any problems in any business.

It is not like every business will fall out into a disaster but it is proactive to have one in place than to have none.

BCP Vs DR

The main difference between BCP and DR is that business continuity planning is one-time planning to keep the business from ‘whatever’ disaster that may attack in the future whereas disaster recovery is the continuous planning or a plan made to prepare for recovery in a business. Disaster recovery is a portion of BCP.

A business continuity plan is a plan that identifies any risk and threatening moments that could hammer the business journey. It is also a contingency plan for each aspect of the business such as for management, human resources, business processes, finance, and assets, etc which may get attacked through any means.

Whereas disaster recovery is an integral part of business continuity and is more of a service to a plan after a disaster is encountered such as a natural disaster, massive data loss, or a hack. A well-drafted plan that helps an organization in regaining access to the functionalities of IT is known as a disaster recovery plan. 

Comparison Table Between BCP and DR

Parameters of Comparison

Business Continuity Planning

Disaster Recovery

Meaning 

Business Continuity is an organization’s ability to restore its predefined levels of service and/or product delivery to its customers. 

DR plan is programmed to continuously replicate the data to the target cloud and load it immediately to the source location.

Why is it important?

Business continuity planning is important for a firm because it allows the organization’s critical situation, catastrophe management, or risk management to continue to operate in the face of irregular developments.

Disaster recovery is important because if a business is not available after a disaster, it may suffer lost revenue, lost customers, or will lose sales.

Purpose

The purpose of the business continuity plan is to regain and have access to the business that is discontinued due to various nameable reasons. 

The purpose of a disaster recovery plan is to furnish detailed strategies & methods on how the business will resume after hazardous respites and hardships.

Plan

A plan designed to continue the business operations

A plan designed to recover the IT and infrastructure after a disaster.

Example

Computer viruses, fire accidents, etc.

Data sabotage, cyber-attacks, business disruptions, etc.

What is a Business Continuity Plan?

Business management has traditionally included business continuity management. It’s a method of guaranteeing that firms can continue to operate even in the face of man-made or natural calamities. Businesses may ensure that their operations continue regardless of the damages by having a plan in place.

In the day-to-day operations of any corporate firm, business continuity planning is critical. Any risk to the company’s assets, safeguarding processes that will be impacted due to an employee’s protracted illness, loss due to a strike, the company’s wear and tear, and so many other factors must be addressed quickly and seriously.

A business continuity plan (BCP) delineates how the company would run in the event of hardship, such as natural disasters, unplanned strikes, or civil wars.

In an MNC, BCP often implicates the operations of a team working on a specific site to assess the viability of their BCP.

Business Continuity Planning (BCP) is a catastrophe recovery strategy in which companies plan to restore their whole business process. 

Workstations, phones, workspaces, apps, network connections, servers, and other resources critical to the business process are all part of a BCP.

What is Disaster Recovery?

Disaster Recovery (DR) is an operational concept that establishes a method for backing up your existing systems in a systematic manner with the assumption that this data can be utilized if your existing system fails catastrophically and no longer provides the necessary level or quality of service.

All businesses need an IT disaster recovery plan since calamities occur without warning and most often when they are least expected. 

Creating a solid IT disaster recovery plan is not a huge undertaking, but it does necessitate some upfront investment.

In cloud computing, Disaster recovery is the process of identifying your organization’s business-critical applications and ensuring that they are restored within a certain period before the impact of their unavailability becomes unbearable to the business. 

With cloud computing, the concepts stay the same, therefore you’ll follow the same processes as in a traditional BCP program until you’ve completed the business impact analysis and risk assessment.

A DR plan comprises recognizing crucial IT systems and networks, categorizing the RTO, and reporting the activities required to resume, reconstruct, and recover IT systems and networks.

Main Differences Between BCP and DR

  1. BCP refers to a replacement or a supplementary. When things grow difficult or risky, backup of anything or any scenario is something that takes the place of another. DR plan refers to the act or process of recovering or reclaiming possession of something that has been lost.
  2. The field of disaster recovery is multifaceted. It necessitates coordinated contributions from a variety of agencies from various sectors. Whereas, a business continuity plan needs the involvement of the management.
  3. The process of producing an extra copy of data to back up is known as BCP. On the other hand, disaster recovery refers to the strategy and procedures for promptly restoring access to applications and data.
  4. Business continuity is an operational discipline that aims to restore important business processes after a disruption. Disaster Recovery is an IT discipline that focuses on restoring IT systems.
  5. Business continuity focuses on keeping the business alive whereas the disaster recovery plan focuses on the recovery of the data lost.

Conclusion

The main difference between both terms can be inferred from the occurrence of the events in a business organization. Professionals in business continuity planning and disaster recovery can assist a company and its workers in achieving resiliency. 

Drafting a strategy is a lengthy process that includes doing a business impact analysis (BIA) and a risk analysis, as well as developing Business continuity planning and Disaster recovery plans, tests, exercises, and training. 

Disaster recovery is all about IT systems & data. Business continuity is about processes, humans, locations and IT systems & data.

References

  1. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/6320588
  2. https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/IJES-12-2020-0074/full/html