Business continuity management (BCM) software, also known as business continuity planning (BCP) software, helps companies identify and address potential disruptions in their operations. This type of software is used to ensure the uninterrupted flow of a company’s operations by identifying risks, estimating their disruptive potential, and implementing procedures to mitigate them. Organizations also use business continuity management software for compliance purposes.
Business continuity management program (BCMP) solutions are essential tools that organizations use to handle every stage of the business continuity life cycle, from planning to crisis activation. These solutions offer features for assessing availability risks, conducting business impact analysis (BIA), mapping dependencies among business processes and resources, managing recovery plans, coordinating crisis response exercises, and analyzing BCMP metrics to improve resilience.
Business continuity management tools are utilized primarily by compliance and risk management professionals and by departments responsible for quality management and security. Organizations typically implement business continuity management systems as part of their governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) strategies.
Business continuity management software can be delivered as a standalone solution or as a component of governance, risk, and compliance suites. When provided separately, this type of software integrates with solutions for risk management, disaster recovery, quality management software, and emergency notification software.
To qualify for inclusion in the Business Continuity Management category, a product must:
Include features for business resilience, recovery, and contingency
Provide standard continuity programs as well as plans that can be customized
Deliver workflows to deploy crisis management plans
Alert internal and external users when incidents occur
Estimate the potential disruption of various types of risks
Evaluate the efficiency of the business continuity activities
