It’s easy to complain about why all businesses do not have business continuity management (BCM); why some don’t even know what it does or means. But we are where we are; it is what it is. However, for me, the really exciting part is what we do next to make 2017 the defining year for business resilience around the world…
It is important not to focus too much on how we want things to be. But it’s important to focus on what the current situation is and has been for some time now. Organizations with great investment, acceptance and motivation to have BCM embedded, generally do exceptionally well.
Public sector organizations that must have BCM as part of their statutory legislation will continue to do their very best to convince the powers that be, that it really is an ‘investment not an expense’. Yet at the dawn of 2017 many business leaders, entrepreneurs, organizations, business banks and insurance companies still fail to see the true value and connection of business, personal resilience and preparedness to the challenges of today.
Who should take and share the blame for the situation we face today? Well it’s more important to be positive and influence the culture because my intuition tells me it really isn’t that hard to do if we want to achieve it. The key is to make sure that our actions match our ambitions. It’s not just about having ideas; it’s about making ideas happen!
So, the options are:
- Do nothing – keep the cardigan’s on and take a seat in the comfort zone;
- Believe the BCM profession is perfect as it is and that those outside the bubble need to change their way of thinking about BCM;
- Be happy because your organization fully supports BCM and business resilience;
Talk, debate and theorise about how we can improve things but take forever and day to come up with yet more options; - Do something fundamentally different today, to make a difference, today.
What keeps business leaders awake at night isn’t the thought that they haven’t put BCM on their list of things to do. Trying to ‘win’ them over with a proverb, famous quotation or a picture isn’t going to change their mind-set either. Such actions only serve to reassure the resilience professionals of the need to be prepared.
Business leaders think about making money, trading and operating. That’s their ambition. Their actions try to match their ambitions. It’s as simple as that.
Business resilience can provide those businesses with the ability to continue achieving their ambition. It just needs to be simple enough to be recognized, achieved and wanted in 2017.
We can do something fundamentally different today to make a difference; if we truly want to. There is a fear that if we don’t want to have any ambitions to widen the appeal of business resilience, then our actions will match our ambitions and we do nothing about it but complain or sit back contented in the zone, with what you’ve got. If that’s what you want, then I have no problem with that; but it’s not what I believe: and it’s not what my intuition tells me to do. Business resilience will be great in 2017 because we have the ambition to make it so.
The fear of the situation staying the same gives us the courage to make a difference going forward. Without fear you can’t have courage.
