Elliot Ross has a great post titled Disaster Preparedness And Recovery with some excellent links to a write-up of a first person account from Japan called Some Perspectives on the Japan Earthquake. In that article, a description was given on how quickly the disaster recovery plans were put in place.  Apparently this team had their disaster plans in place and working within 15 seconds.  15 seconds….that’s a short amount of time.

What about your disaster recovery plans? Do you have them? Have you practiced them?

I know many IT groups that have a business continuity and disaster recovery plan in place, but few have actually practiced this plans regularly.  Sure…there are quite a few meetings held to discuss the disaster plan and perhaps there are a few exercises at first to ‘practice’ what teams will do in a disaster – but few undertake regular, ongoing practice to make sure their teams are prepared for the worst.

In the story described above, it was made extremely clear that the entire country of Japan was well drilled in what to do in case of disaster.  I’d bet money that the emergency services in the US are well prepared for emergencies – that’s their job. They’ve shown their ability to respond in many instances across many disasters.

But…are we – those of us in business – really ready for a disaster?  Are you confident that your company will be able to run smoothly after a natural disaster?  You may have a plan in place and perhaps you’ve practice a few times…but have you drilled your team to be truly prepared?

What if you don’t have a team? What if your entire IT is outsourced to the cloud….what’s your cloud provider’s disaster recovery plan(s)?   Do they have one?  Have you talked to them about it?

So I ask you this….if you have a small business or a small team, do you have an emergency preparedness plan? Does your outsourced vendors have a plan?  Have you practiced what you would do in case of an emergency?  Have you asked your vendors to practice with you?

Do you know what you will do if something disastrous happens and you don’t have access to your financial systems, your website, your email or your customer management system? Will you be able to survive a few days, weeks or months without your primary systems? If not…what can you do today to make sure you can get by in case of disaster?

Take some time to think about it and prepare.  Because its not a question of “if”….its a question of “when.”

Image Credit: Hindenburg disaster By History In An Hour on flickr

While the open source world has been a viable area for quite some time, there seems to be a lot of talk these days of open-sourcing many things. Google has opened up Android, the Department of Homeland Security has just announced an open source intrusion detection engine, and more organizations are embracing open source platforms while also complaining about open source software overload.

Welcome to the open source world…whether you want to be a part of it or not….open source is here to stay.

Open Source

Take a second to jump over and read the definition of Open Source as defined by the Open Source Initiative.     Lots of interesting stuff there: Access to source code. Redistribution rights. Technology-neutrality.  Integrity of original code.  Good stuff….if you can understand how to take advantage of it within the enterprise.

Open source has its roots in the ‘free software’ movement but the open source world of today is a far cry from that of the free software movement in the past.  No longer is the main argument for free software….its moved into a more pragmatic argument of making software development a more open environment.

The open source world is an amazing one…and its an environment that many CIO’s and IT departments have tried to stay away from. I think its time to change that.

Open Source & The Enterprise

In the past, many people have argued against Open Source in the enterprise.  Most of the arguments against the open source movement have been based around security concerns, support concerns and/or intellectual property issues.

While some of these concerns are valid, I think many organizations, CIO’s and IT departments have a pre-defined prejudice against the open source world. They see this world as nothing but a bunch of hackers giving things away for free.

Far from the truth….but even if it were the truth…what’s wrong with it?  If I were working within an organization that had resource constraints (budget, people, etc), I’d have to look for ways to be more effective with the resources I do have.

Take a second to step back and rethink the open source world. Think about the people. Think about the willingness to give. Think about the community that exists out there.  Think about the hundreds of people that are willing to give their time to develop a piece of functionality that could be beneficial to you.

Look at WordPress (also WordPress.com) as an example.  Its one of the largest blogging / content platforms in the world with over 25 million people using the software to power their blogs. Its also an open source project with hundreds of volunteers contributing to the code base to extend features and functionality. The WordPress platform is used by individuals (it powers this blog) and Fortune 500 companies to run their blogs and content platforms….its even used by the Boy Scouts of America‘s  to run the website for Boys’ Life magazine.

If you were looking for a content management platform and couldn’t spend tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars buying and implementing one, WordPress could be an ideal choice. So could other platforms like Drupal or Joomla among many others.

With these open source platforms, you’ve got thousands of people willing to give their time and effort to build more functionality (in the form of plugins and themes), most of which wouldn’t cost you a dime.  If you did want to add some specialized functionality to your platform, there are thousands (or more) WordPress developers out there who can do some amazing things for very little money (think thousands of dollars versus hundreds of thousands for closed-source platforms).

But…what if you’ve already got money sunk into another system?  What if you already have a fully built IT architecture based on Microsoft platforms….open source isn’t an option for you….or is it?

Open source is always an option….you’ve just got to change how you think about the open source approach.

Open Source, The Enterprise and The Community

Let’s say you are a .NET shop.  Your entire IT architecture is built with Microsoft systems.  You run windows as your web server, SQL Server for your database platforms, Sharepoint for collaboration and content management and you have zero interest in replacing any of these platforms.

When I talk about open source….you probably shrug your shoulders and say “not for us…we’re a .NET shop”.  Well…you’d be wrong. Look at Umbraco for example….its a .NET open source CMS platform.  Brilliant!

Open source isn’t implementing the LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP) stack…its an approach to your business.

You can still be a .NET shop and embrace the open source community.

So…now you argue that open source isn’t secure.   Bollocks I say! (I’ve been waiting 4 years to use that on my blog).

Open source can be as secure as you want it to be.   You define the entry- and exit-paths for open source software and data flow.  Perhaps you setup an API that allows non-sensitive data to flow in or out.  Perhaps you setup certain non-critical functions to allow open source software to be implemented.

There are lots of ways to argue against the “open source security” argument.  The biggest argument is that security is as security does….you make your systems secure today with closed-source software…the same can be done with open source software too.

Open source platforms & software can bring a lot of value to an organization…you’ve just go to be willing to open your mind to open source. An open source approach & mindset can help in many ways.  It can save you money…but it can also allow you to reach out to the community (either your internal community or an external community) for help.

The open source community could be a lifeline for non-profits and community groups.  Imagine what an organization like the Red Cross, the Boy Scouts of America or The United Way could do if they embraced the open source movement and then embraced their community for help?

What about a for-profit company?  Can you still ‘embrace your community”?  Maybe…maybe not.  You’ll have to figure out if you have a community first…but that shouldn’t stop you from embracing the open source community as a whole.

There are a lot of smart folks out there just itching to solve a new challenge…reach out and find them…you’d be surprised just how much you can do when you open not only your IT platforms but also your mind.

The open source approach is much more than a philosophical approach to software / hardware /IT….its an approach that allows you to embrace your community to help you move forward.  You’ve already started embracing the community on the marketing side of the house to help ‘spread the word’….why not use that new-found good will and ask for help on the technical side of the house?

Join me next week for more on how non-profits can embrace their community (more specifically how one non-profit has not embraced theirs).

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Most of the things I’ve read on the topic of small business IT outsourcing has been fairly light in terms of advice for small business owners. Most articles are written with the vendor in mind but there are a few focused on the small business owner who’s looking to outsource.

One of the better articles was found on Small Business Computing in an article titled “Ten Points to Ponder before you Outsource“. The “ten points” offered in the above article are quite good but I felt like they could be expanded a bit to include some examples.  Below is a summary of the ten points plus some additional discussion and examples.

Outsourcing Small Business IT & Technology – Key points to consider

• Look at the big picture. Do you need to be focused on keeping an email server or web server running or focus on marketing and business development?   Should you be focused on keeping your small business technology running or growing your small business?  If you want to be around next year, you’d better focus on growing your small business.
• Look at value over price. As a small business, you need to save as much money as possible whenever and wherever you can…but….you also get what you pay for.  If you pay someone for email service, do you pick the cheapest vendor that will setup a few email accounts for you and then never answer your phone calls….or do you pick the mid-tier vendor who asks for a bit more money and then holds your hand throughout migration process and offers 24/7 support?
• Pay for expertise. If you are going to spend your hard earned money for something, you should get as much value as possible from that outsourced service/product/person.   Part of the decision making process for outsourcing should include the amount of expertise you are paying for.  For example, if you outsource your payroll, you sure as heck better get an expert payroll provider.
• Stay on the cutting edge When you outsource your IT functions, do you want to give your business to someone who’s using yesterday’s technology or tomorrow’s?  Let’s look at a web developer as an example.  You need to outsource your new website…do you hire someone still using Frontpage to design/build websites or do you hire someone who can build a website using a much more modern technology/platform?  Hint: go with modern on this one.
• Does the vendor have similar values as you? Have you ever hired someone to do some work for you and then found out that they didn’t have the work ethic you had?  That would be a huge issue for a small business owner outsourcing IT functions.  When looking to outsource, take some time to get to know your vendor(s) (and they should want to get to know you too) to make sure your values are their values…or at least that their values don’t clash with yours.
• Meet the Vendor’s team before signing the contract.  While many people meet with the sales person or perhaps the vendor’s leadership team, I strongly suggest that you reach out and try to meet with the team that would be working on your project.  Sometimes this is impossible to get to know the whole team but if possible, do it.
• Know what you’re getting.  This is a no-brainer on the surface. Let’s say you want to outsource the design/build of a new website.  You hire a firm to design and build your website and you expect them to completely migrate content and/or create content. Content is part of the website correct?  They sell you a design/build project without clearly stating that content migration isn’t included.  When they finish, you have a website that looks pretty and works well but with no content!  Now you’ve got to spend more money to get content into the website.  Not a good situation to be in.
• Understand Responsibilities. While the deliverables of the service/product should be clearly outlined in any contract, you’ve also got to fully understand the responsibilities of each side.   This should be clearly stated in a scope of work document when working with a good vendor…but you need to be absolutely certain you know who’s doing what before signing the contract.
• Should you outsource to a big player or small business? This is a personal decision for each business.  You can outsource your email service to Google or you can find a local small business that can do something very similar for you.   You’ll sometimes pay more to the local business, but you’ll also receive more personalized service from a good vendor.
• Find a vendor that can educate. Ever talked to an IT person and heard lots of acronyms and technical mumbo-jumbo and had no clue what they were talking about?  Would you hire them to do your IT? Maybe you would…but you’d have a hard time understanding what they are doing or want to do for you.  Find a vendor that can speak to you in terms you can understand.  Find someone that can educate you along the way. That’s the person you want to hire.

Outsourcing anything, whether email, payroll or brochure design, takes the same type of thought process for small business owners.   While price is a consideration for you, there are many other items to think about when outsourcing part of your business.

Stay tuned for more small business technology related posts…looking to make this a regular feature.

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