For a third consecutive year, ITWC (formerly known as IT World Canada), in conjunction with Rogers Communications, surveyed 147 Chief Information Officers (CIOs) and their equivalents to find out more about their day-to-day challenges and published the 2015 CIO Census Report Canadian CIO.
This showcases how CIOs execute their mandate within their organizations and offers insights into what matters most to our Canadian IT leaders that you could leverage.
The overarching theme this year was around collaboration, however, I’m most appreciative about one of the CIOs main concerns - to protect enterprise data through a sound disaster recovery plan.
Half of Canadian CIOs see Disaster Recovery as a top priority in the next 12 months.
Are you ready to deploy a Disaster Recovery Plan this year?
These are the four major components of your project plan:
1. Assess the risk2. Align your infrastructure to your business continuity plan3. Protect critical business services and infrastructure. Assure business continuity
Where do you start? Ask yourself these questions:
Do I have a secure second site to replicate and/or host my DR?
If the answer is no, you should start looking for a partner that has a multiple data center footprints across the country.
Where is my data located currently?
Canadian companies should be replicating to a Canadian Cloud. Why? Because maintaining Canadian data sovereignty by storing your information in a facility located in Canada with a private and secure network is a best practice. Canada offers no protections against the PATRIOT Act and only British Columbia and Nova Scotia have enacted any form of protection against the PATRIOT Act.
What type of facility is holding my data?
There can be a world of difference between promises and performance, therefore a certified Tier III or IV Data Center meets the highest standards of data center security and availability and will be robust and less prone to failures.
Can I successfully replicate my data from my location to a secondary DR site?
I highly advise finding a provider and partner that can help architect, deploy and manage your DR. There are many DR solutions therefore finding a partner that can not only recommend but, architect, implement and manage your strategy while using industry leading T1 hardware and software is essential in getting the right service aligned to your business needs at a reasonable cost.
How do I make sure that my data is safely stored even when in a data center?
You need to verify that your provider uses a FIPS 140 Certified Replication tool because it provides Government approved encryption and certifies that your data is stored securely.
You may also want to look into partnering with a Cloud DR provider that also offers Cloud VMs. Your data could be easily restored on a cloud VM in the event your on premise servers are not available. Many Cloud providers claim to provide Cloud DR but most of them don’t have a Tier III data center located in Canada, or have the skill and expertise to help architect, implement and manage a DR solution.
2016 Goal:
Robust. Resilient. Bulletproof.
Feel free to contact me for advice and to discuss your challenges and business needs.
Chris Charette, Co-Founder, Vice President, Business Development, 905.508.8489, ext. 302.