Many Canadian small and mid-sized businesses wonder if they need a dedicated disaster recovery team to protect their operations. In simple terms, a disaster recovery team is a group responsible for planning and executing steps to restore your IT systems and data after an unexpected event like a cyberattack, hardware failure, or natural disaster. While larger enterprises often have specialized teams, smaller businesses usually manage disaster recovery through their IT provider or internal IT staff.
Why disaster recovery matters for your business
Downtime and data loss can be costly for any business. When your systems are offline, staff productivity drops, customers may lose trust, and you risk falling behind competitors. For Canadian SMBs, the stakes include compliance with privacy standards like PIPEDA, which require protecting customer data. Without a clear disaster recovery plan and team, recovering from incidents can be slow and chaotic, increasing financial and reputational damage.
A typical scenario for a 50-person company
Imagine a 50-employee Canadian company hit by ransomware. Their backups are stored on-site but were also encrypted by the attack. Without a dedicated disaster recovery team or plan, IT staff scramble to assess damage, restore data, and communicate with stakeholders. This delays recovery by days, causing lost sales and frustrated customers. A managed IT provider with a disaster recovery service would have off-site backups, tested recovery procedures, and a clear communication plan, enabling faster restoration and minimizing impact.
Practical checklist: What to do now
- Ask your IT provider: Do you have a documented disaster recovery plan? How often is it tested? Where are backups stored?
- Review service agreements: Check recovery time objectives (RTO) and recovery point objectives (RPO) to understand how quickly and how much data can be restored.
- Verify backup security: Ensure backups are stored off-site or in the cloud, isolated from primary systems to prevent simultaneous loss.
- Test internal readiness: Confirm who is responsible for disaster recovery tasks and if staff know their roles during an incident.
- Check access controls: Review who can access backups and recovery tools to reduce insider risk.
- Plan communication: Establish how to inform employees, customers, and partners during an outage.
Next steps for your business
For most Canadian SMBs, having a separate disaster recovery team isn't necessary if you work with a trusted managed IT provider who includes disaster recovery in their services. The key is having a clear, tested plan and reliable backups managed by professionals. Talk to your current IT provider or a local IT advisor about your disaster recovery readiness. They can help you assess risks, improve your plan, and ensure your business can bounce back quickly from unexpected disruptions.