Being Prepared Goes a Long Way Toward Averting Disaster

Data recovery is a major pain point for small businesses, but not all organizations have the same resources and assets that make it possible. Small businesses in particular are more prone to forego data backup and disaster recovery because it does not provide an immediate return on investment. Well, we’re here to tell you that this mindset is wrong.

In a lot of ways, having data recovery for your business is kind of like insurance; you want to have it in case an emergency strikes, as the disaster could potentially be more devastating than paying for the service itself. Think about it like this; does it actually hurt your business to have data backup and disaster recovery?

We’re here to walk you through some important information to consider for your own data backup and disaster recovery solution. You want to focus on two specific areas for your disaster recovery solution: how much data you need to restore, also known as the recovery point objective (RPO), and how long it takes to recover that data, or recovery time objective (RTO).

Recovery Point Objective (RPO)

Our earlier explanation is a bit simplistic, in all actuality. Recovery point objective is more clearly defined as the maximum age of files that need to be restored in the event of a disaster in order to resume normal operations. The RPO is expressed in days, hours, minutes, and even seconds moving into the past from the moment of the data loss incident. RPO also takes into account how often backups are taken and when.

Recovery Time Objective (RTO)

As explained earlier, RTO involves how long the process of data recovery takes to get you back to a place where normal operations can resume. You generally want to shoot for a minimum amount of downtime for something like this to reduce wasted resources. Depending on how much data you have to restore, RTO might take some time. This is why RTO is often staggered into steps starting with the most critical of data. From there, data that is less important can be restored over a longer period of time, based on how necessary it is to get back to normal operations.

Both RPO and RTO play significant roles in helping your organization determine the best path forward in the event of a disaster. If you are not sure how to approach either of these requirements, we have just the solution.

Does your business need a hand with implementing a comprehensive data backup and disaster recovery plan? Washington Works can equip you with a BDR solution designed for maximum data restoration and minimal downtime. To learn more, reach out to us at 301-571-5040.