Editor's Note: This newsletter is now renamed Unified Communications. The name change reflects the newsletter's broader focus as we report on the industry's move toward a unified messaging model. We hope you will continue to enjoy the newsletter and thank you for reading.

E-mail and other communications technologies have become absolutely critical not only to the success of businesses large and small, but also to their very survival. For example, a Gartner study published in 2001 found that two out of five enterprises shut the doors within five years of having gone through a disaster.

We tend to think of disaster recovery and business continuity as necessary for events like hurricanes and floods. However, the current cold snap in the Seattle area is a good example of a type of ‘disaster’ that can have very serious consequences for an information-oriented business. Although Seattle and the suburbs surrounding it have received only a few inches of snow, the mass of cold air that has settled on us has created difficult driving conditions, meaning tens of thousands of information workers and others have had to work from home or not work at all.

In this disaster scenario, the vast majority of the infrastructure is still in place: the power is on for almost everyone, broadband is up and running and the phones are working. The disaster, therefore, is simply the fact that the people who use the infrastructure can’t get to work. That means that for those who weren’t prepared to stay home, they need all of the access codes, phone numbers and other information necessary to be productive, and almost all of that is tied up in their e-mail system.

It’s also important to know how to operate personal infrastructure, such as routers and switches, so that one’s home computer can provide access to corporate resources. Employers cannot assume that all of their information workers are experts in the use of their own wireless networks, etc. Plus, it’s critical for home computers to be sufficiently protected so that they don’t introduce viruses and malware into the corporate network.

The point is that disaster recovery and business continuity infrastructure are critical to the long term success of any organization, but so are the simpler things like making sure that employees know how to access corporate systems when they unexpectedly have to work from home.

Michael Osterman is principal analyst of Osterman Research.