We live in hazardous times. Every second of every day somewhere in the world things are happening. Devastating things. Events that might have consequences that no one can foresee. Natural disasters. And man-made ones. Events that can harm people. And businesses. We may not be able to stop them happening, but we can be prepared. When an incident disrupts your business, the clock is ticking. There's no time for hesitation. Wondering what you can do. How to respond. It's time for action. Decisive action. For companies with business continuity plans, it's time to put them into practice. The scope of the risk is anything from reputational loss that can be overcome over time, right the way through to a complete collapse of a business. One of the key messages about business continuity is around convincing your customers that you can continue to deliver that service under any circumstance. But it goes further than that. It says to your staff that you care enough about their own well-being and livelihoods that you've thought through your ability to be able to recover. And importantly, during the recession, it also says to your owners, your financial backers, that you can also withstand an incident and therefore their ability to fund you, shouldn't be undermined as a result of their concerns. Should you suffer a disaster? Business continuity management is vital, because failure to develop capability could have a devastating impact on the organisation. But success in taking BCM into the boardroom and risk decision-making can actually build a more resilient, more agile business. For companies without plans, an incident can become a crisis. A crisis can become a catastrophe. Following a disaster, around a quarter of businesses never reopen. 80% of companies that don't recover within a month are likely to go out of business. 75% of companies without business continuity plans fail within three years. Times are hard for businesses everywhere. Term oil in the Eurozone, economic slowdown, sovereign debt crises, the credit squeeze, the threat of global recession. Some businesses will survive, some will go under, and it's a fine line in between. But companies that practice business continuity management are resilient. They have analysed their business and know what their priorities are. They have identified the things that are essential to them and the things they can manage without for a while. They even know for how long. They have developed plans for protecting their people, their business, their stakeholders, their reputation, and they've tested them to make sure they're effective. Their employees are aware of what to do with an incident and where they should carry on working from, if necessary. The aim is to get the business back up and running in the shortest possible time. And it works. When businesses were asked if business continuity management mitigated the impact of a disruption, 82% of them said yes. And 74% said they were able to continue delivering key products and services to their customers. In an uncertain world, companies with business continuity plans have an advantage. When the clock is ticking, they're ahead of the game. If ever there was a time when resilience was needed, the time is now.