[The Impact Of Stakeholder Influence On The Implementation Of A Business Continuity Plan]

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Chapter 1: Introduction

The groups of people who regularly interact with a business, such as customers, partners, vendors, investors and employees, are collectively the business's stakeholders. Each group has different needs and expectations from a business. These differences come into focus in the context of a business continuity plan, which documents the way a business will react to disaster scenarios that disrupt normal business operations. An ideal continuity plan will meet each of the stakeholders' needs simultaneously.

Significance

Businesses provide continuity plans for the stakeholders whom the plan affects. Stakeholders, in turn, review the plan to confirm that the business can survive disruptive scenarios such as acts of terrorism, natural disasters like floods or hurricanes and infrastructural disruptions like power outages. The plan informs stakeholders of the specific actions that must be taken, the specific employees who must take those actions and the order in which the actions should be taken depending on the nature of the disruptive event.

A business interacts with different groups of stakeholders as part of standard operations. At a minimum, a business's stakeholders are its employees and customers. Employees are typically most concerned with knowing when their working conditions and schedules will return to normal following a disruption, while customers are most concerned about the availability of the products or services they buy from the business. Depending on the type of business, stakeholder groups such as vendors, suppliers, partners, distributors, shareholders and investors may have various particular concerns about a business continuity plan and the way it will affect them.

Stakeholders require business continuity plans to describe in detail the actions the business takes under various disruption scenarios and to specify when the business will be able to resume meeting its stakeholders' needs. Plans may specify that the company will address different stakeholders' needs at different stages during recovery from a disruption. Stakeholders look for continuity plans that ensure that a business can return to normal operations as rapidly as possible following a business disruption.

Theoretical Framework

Different stakeholders have different needs from a business, but because businesses have finite resources, they typically cannot meet the needs of all stakeholders with equal speed. Generally, a business places a high priority on meeting the needs of its current customers and on generating revenue from sales to new customers following a disruption. The revenue generated, in turn, allows a key stakeholder group--employees--to return to work quickly. The needs of stakeholder groups such as vendors may temporarily be a lower priority following a disruption, as a ...