Why Business Continuity Planning is Critical in the Mining Industry

Business Continuity Planning is Critical in the Mining Industry

Technological innovation has driven large-scale optimisation for businesses in all industries. The mining industry is no exception. IT solutions of all kinds help mining companies work smarter and streamline operations. However, despite the huge variety of benefits that innovative IT solutions offer, mining companies are made more vulnerable by relying on these solutions.

In an increasingly hostile cyber environment and with natural disasters becoming more common and unpredictable, mining professionals need to prioritise business continuity planning in order to protect and maintain operations – even in the worst-case scenario.

Business Continuity Planning in the Mining Industry

Everything your mining company needs to know about preparing for cyber disasters

Business continuity planning has become a critical component of cybersecurity for businesses in all industries. However, mining companies face unique risks and challenges, which makes business continuity planning even more important.

However, many mining companies are still confused about why they’re organisations are at risk and what they can do to prepare for cyber disasters and sustain operations – even when a cyber disaster strikes. Business continuity planning is all about creating a proactive and deliberate strategy to ensure mining companies are still able to function and do business while facing the worst-case scenario.

Why Are Mining Companies at Increased Risk?

We hear from mining companies all the time and the story is usually the same. While leadership teams recognise the importance of cybersecurity, they rarely believe that their company will ever be hit by an unexpected cyber disaster. Additionally, even if they do believe there’s a possibility that disaster will strike, many mining companies are convinced they’ll be able to bounce back with little-to-no business disruption.

However, this is simply wishful thinking. The reality is, cyber disasters are so inherently unpredictable that there is no way to gauge when they’ll occur or how negative the consequences will be. In fact, recent years have seen the development of specific trends that make the negative impacts of a cyber disaster even more likely for mining companies of all sizes.

Here are the top trends in mining that can increase the negative business consequences of a cyber disaster:

• Greater interdependencies between operations and downstream
• Tighter supply chains
• Reductions in capacity redundancy and working capital
• Recovery of commodity prices

With these trends in mind, mining professionals should try to create dynamic and proactive business continuity strategies that directly respond to these challenges. Doing so will allow mining companies to recover efficiently from any cyber incident and ensure disruptions to business and profit are kept to an absolute minimum.

Business Continuity Strategies for Mining Professionals

If you’re a construction professional hoping to be more prepared in the face of ongoing IT innovation and industry change, you might feel lost on where to start. The first step is to stay calm. The worst thing you could do is let the doom and gloom get to you and make you feel like your cybersecurity effort is hopeless. The reality is, creating dynamic and proactive disaster recovery and business continuity plans for the mining industry doesn’t have to be mission impossible. Check out our top four strategies for getting and staying prepared below.

Here’s the top ways your mining company can get on top of business continuity planning:

• Get informed

Start by taking an inventory of two things: IT resources you rely on and existing threats that could interrupt your business. By getting informed, you’ll be going a long way in terms of knowing what vulnerabilities exist and how you can patch them.

Take stock of all the different IT resources your mining operation relies on. Then do a little research on what cyber-threats are making headlines. This way, you’ll know what threats to look out for, and more importantly, you’ll know which IT assets you need to prioritise and restore should disaster strike.

• Put plans to paper

We can’t stress this step enough. It’s critical that you develop hardline policies and procedures that give detailed disaster recovery and business continuity instructions. Even more important? Don’t just talk about these polices and procedures – get them on paper and make them easily accessible to your entire team.

By keeping a ‘business continuity bible’ on hand, you’ll be emphasising the importance of being proactive and vigilant to your team. Even better? You’ll have a comprehensive reference guide on hand that will help you navigate the stress of a cyber disaster.

• Involve your team

The fact of the matter is, the majority of cyber disasters happen as a result of human error. This means that your team can either be your worst nightmare or secret weapon when it comes to cybersecurity.

In order to make sure your team is positioned to be your cybersecurity secret weapon, be sure to keep lines of communication open. Talk to your team about emerging threats and invest in cybersecurity training. When it comes to disaster recovery and business continuity planning, empower your team to take action and prioritise operational restoration using the policies and procedures you’ve developed.

• Get support

Finally, as you work to develop a customised business continuity plan, don’t be afraid to reach out to a team of IT experts for support. Particularly, try to find a team of IT specialists that have experience providing business continuity services for the mining industry.

The right IT support provider will help you with all the aspects of business continuity planning that we’ve described here, from initial planning, the development of policies and procedures, team training, and more.

Finding the Right Support: Professional Business Continuity Services for the Mining Industry

Now that we’ve gone over why business continuity planning for mining professionals is important, and how you can get started, the only thing left to do is find the right professional support to make it happen. Mining teams are busy and are rightly focused on mission-critical business, so finding the time to develop detailed and strategic business continuity plans can be a challenge.

That’s why organisations should consider enlisting professional support. Predicting when a disaster will happen or how negatively it will impact your operations is difficult. However, with a team of experienced and professional IT experts on your side, you’ll be going along way in terms of taking a proactive and robust approach to preparing for the worst-case scenario.

Is your mining organisation looking to get on top of business continuity planning? Why not start by reaching out to the team of IT specialists from Xyber Solutions? Our team has extensive experience helping Australian mining companies get more prepared with dynamic and proactive disaster recovery and business continuity strategies. We believe in creating customised business continuity plans that help prepare and protect mining companies from end-to-end.

Don’t wait for the worst-case scenario to happen to your mining company. Business continuity planning for the mining industry doesn’t have to be tedious or overwhelming. Let the team of tech experts from Xyber Solutions help. Reach our team anytime at 1300 568 888.