When I worked at AutoStar Solutions, I led a quarterly exercise where I'd present a hypothetical disaster scenario to the management team and we'd discuss how we'd respond and continue our business. Weather related emergencies, war, cyber-security, and even negative publicity were all subjects we covered. We didn't seek to find all the answers during these sessions, but it gave us a good roadmap to follow if such an incident were to occur.
This type of planning has crossed my mind lately as several clients have reached out wanting to discuss their own disaster preparation. The scenario that has come up repeatedly has been how to continue the business if there were to be a cyber-security incident or if a key service provider suffered one and was taken offline. The two most frequent questions have involved either the DMS or a payments provider being incapacitated for some length of time.
Do You Have Any Sort of Disaster Plan?
In conversations with people, there is a tendency to refer to a disaster plan that's been adopted for a weather related emergency, since those are the most common disasters that folks plan around. That's a start, but I don't think it fits very well with the scenario we're discussing. In the case of weather, everyone's life is being disrupted. Customers and employees alike may not be able to make it to your store and phones and internet may be down. In a more targeted scenario such as the one being presented here, life goes on. Customers are able to get to and from work, the lines of communication are still open, and on the surface it's "business as usual" for everyone but you and perhaps anyone else using the same service provider.
Create A Specific Plan
To maintain some basis of business continuity in this type of crisis, it's important to develop a plan ahead of time. We've led clients through an exercise where we gather the key business leaders and discuss how to still sell cars, collect payments and carry on other functions. The goal is to come out of that meeting with a short outline (a few pages) of how continuity would be achieved. For one client, it was printing off 100 blank deal files and making sure the sales department knows how to complete forms and document a sale if the DMS is down. For another, it was establishing a written process for recording payments and keeping records for later input. This is not "one size fits all", the approach has to consider the size and complexity of the business as well as the talents and capabilities of staff.
A Call to Action
Disaster planning isn't fun, and it certainly isn't as urgent as the day to day emergencies that take a lot of attention; however, in the face of some catastrophe it really is a "bet the business" issue, as many dealers learned during the CDK cyber attack. We encourage everyone to spend some time as a leadership team and address your own threatening scenarios. Once that's done, share it with your entire team, so everyone is following the same map if disaster does strike.
Ignite is here to help identify complexities and create solutions that will keep you in business during these critical times. We have experts with decades of experience in identifying and reducing risk. Reach out today to info@ignitecp.com
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