Disaster Management: How Ready Are You After The Boom?

On January 29, 2009, CSO Pakistan organized a closed door, Round Table event on Disaster Management and Business Continuity. Experts from a number of fields and verticals were invited and only a limited number of registered participants were granted access to the event.

The event was moderated by Faisal Khan, CEO of NetAccess Communications (Pvt) Limited, and the panelists included: Dr. Aamir Matin, Country General Manager of Cisco Systems Pakistan, Jehan Ara, President P@SHA, Salman Ansari, CEO of SATC, Raja Mahboob, Senior Vice President Sales & Marketing at CubeXS Weatherly, Asher Faisal Khan, CEO CommTel, Khurram Rahat, Managing Director, Teradata Pakistan, Kamran Meer, CISO Habib Bank Limited, Javed Edhi, CIO of Saudi Pak Bank and Farooq Wahab, IS Security Head at Dubai Islamic Bank.

The audience consisted of senior IT and Business Development heads of various organizations who are exploring BC and DR strategies for their own organization. The objective of the 3-hour discussion was to highlight the various BC challenges companies are faced with and how to increase the learning from the expertise that is already available to us.

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On January 29, 2009, CSO Pakistan organized a closed door, Round Table event on Disaster Management and Business Continuity. Experts from a number of fields and verticals were invited and only a limited number of registered participants were granted access to the event.

The event was moderated by Faisal Khan, CEO of NetAccess Communications (Pvt) Limited, and the panelists included: Dr. Aamir Matin, Country General Manager of Cisco Systems Pakistan, Jehan Ara, President P@SHA, Salman Ansari, CEO of SATC, Raja Mahboob, Senior Vice President Sales & Marketing at CubeXS Weatherly, Asher Faisal Khan, CEO CommTel, Khurram Rahat, Managing Director, Teradata Pakistan, Kamran Meer, CISO Habib Bank Limited, Javed Edhi, CIO of Saudi Pak Bank and Farooq Wahab, IS Security Head at Dubai Islamic Bank.

The audience consisted of senior IT and Business Development heads of various organizations who are exploring BC and DR strategies for their own organization. The objective of the 3-hour discussion was to highlight the various BC challenges companies are faced with and how to increase the learning from the expertise that is already available to us.

Salman Ansari, CEO SATC: The Marriott blast that took place, shook the Evacuee Trust Complex. It is amazing how things came back online, and those lessons are critical for us to learn from. Those companies who had integrated Disaster Recovery planning in place and rehearsed, coupled with the fact that Fiber To The Home, which enabled communications and helped to realize the "anywhere office", helped with recovery.

One of the things my company does is planning of intelligent buildings. Every building now wants to put up a Data Center and while it might be expensive, the ROI can be realized quickly. I do believe there is a business model which exists and it's not only the big guys, the know how and benefit does come down to the little guys. The optical fiber systems that exist in Pakistan has given companies a huge amount of redundant capacity across the country where Enterprise Network spanned cities can be integrated at very low cost. All the physics and infrastructure is already in place and if we can have our planning in place, get the consultants and companies match-made with the people.

These points and the fact that the skill and know how exists in Pakistan, helps to make this country a good, reliable destination to handle the outsourcing. An example I simply have to quote is that of LMKR, where when the media was portraying images of a blast-struck Islamabad, when companies opened up for business in the US, they found they were functioning with LMKR at the back end, at 100%.

Javed Edhi, CIO Saudi Pak Bank: At least in the banking sector, the awareness is there. Even before 9/11, financial institutions have been looking into these solutions. I do think, however, that the Business Continuity or Disaster Management only works if you have a strong paper-based plan to work from.

What I think we lack is consistency. When you are a growing organization, you keep prioritizing tasks. The task of having a Business Continuity plan in place has usually been found somewhere at the bottom of the run. However, with the recent efforts and regulations outlined by the State Bank of Pakistan, they have been trying to ensure that BC is in place and banks and all other organizations have to decide the level of resilience that they can employ. They might not be able to implement the maximum level, but they will be able to decide one some level.