Selecting business continuity consultancy services

Selecting a Business Continuity Consultant

When you engage a business continuity consultant, ensure that have a clear understanding of what you want the consultant to do for you and how you want them to engage with your organisation. Here are four things to consider when thinking of using business continuity consulting services

1. How will the consultant work with you? Will their approach fit for you. Be aware of of consultancy firms that have a fixed "methodology" that they assume will fit your organisation. One-size does not fit all. Beware of consulting firm that want to parachute a team into your organisation. It may be tempting to think that the project can be completely outsourced, but the development of strong business continuity requires detailed knowledge of how your organisation works, its infrastructure and its customers. External parties won't have this knowledge - even if they have some sectoral knowledge. Other consultancy firms will adopt a lighter touch, leveraging the skills and knowledge already present in your organisation, mentoring your people to establish strong business practices - which leaves you in a much better place on completion of the project.

2. What services are you looking for? Some firms may be stronger at some aspects of business continuity than others including:

   1. Audit & compliance - reviewing plans for structure and compliance with standards and frameworks

   2. Training - some consultancy organisations focus on providing business continuity training services which may lead to some kind of certification for participants. These tend to be classroom based initiatives and though they may help in acquiring a certification of some kind, because they are focussed on covering specific content to achieve certification the approach and content is necessarily generic. They are often charged on a per person basis - which means that you may have to send serval people on the same course - which can get expensive.

   3. Firms that will develop business continuity plans for you

   4. Testing some organisations will provide testing services to exercise and improve business continuity plans. These may range from testing the whole organisation or focussing one specific capability such as IT systems recovery or cyber attack defences

   5. Preparation for corporate events. When organisations are ready for public listings, for instance, they will be required to undergo a due diligence process. This will almost certainly include business continuity considerations to provide assurance to investors that the organisation is operationally robust. This may require specialist knowledge of the due diligence process and understanding investor concerns on the part of the consultant.

   6. Supply chain specialists. Supply chain continuity is an important consideration to some industry sectors, such as manufacturing.

3. Has the consultant worked with organisations of similar size before? The consultants experience of size of the organisation also needs to factored in the choice of business continuity consulting firm you choose to work with. Many business continuity consultants work with large organisations with deep pockets and resources. This can result in the development of business continuity plans, processes and resources that are overly "corporate" and don't really work for SME organisations. It is possible to comply with recognised standards and frameworks without establishing a dedicated business continuity team and bureaucratic processes!!

4. Is the consultant proposing a process or an outcome? When you reach the proposal process, is the consultant pitching you a process or an outcome? If they are pitching a process they are essentially describing what they will do rather than the outcome they intend to deliver for you - it could be an indication that they intend to fit you into their preferred process

Overall, think of the consultant as a coach - not a contractor. A contractor does a job, leaves and sends you the bill. A consultant that acts as a coach, will leave you with improved capability and skill by leveraging you organisations intrinsic knowledge to develop a business continuity capability while simultaneously developing the business continuity skills of your people for the future.

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