Implementing and Managing Your Operational Resilience Program

Congratulations - you are either appointed to manage or already part of the team implementing and maintaining the Operational Resilience (OR) Program.  Be it full-time or part-time, it is good to have an understanding of what aspect of the knowledge, the skill set and the challenges are needed to do a good job. So ask yourself, "What is My OR Role?"

If you are looking for specific operational resiliency (OR) training courses with professional certification from BCM Institute, scroll down to the section "What Type of Training Can I Attend?"

Before we start, confirming your understanding of operational resilience is helpful.  It is worth reading "What is Operational Resilience?" 

Let's discuss your assigned OR roles and responsibilities if the differences are apparent.

One of the critical steps in the OR journey is to “speak the same lingo.”  Hence, an organization must define a “disaster” when embarking on operational resiliency (OR) and the many terms used during implementing and managing this OR program.  In our context, aligning and correctly understanding each OR terminology is critical.

What Is A Disaster?

A Disaster is a sudden, unplanned event that causes significant damage or severe loss to an organization. It results in an organization failing to provide critical business functions for some predetermined minimum period.

In short, it denies organizations access to people, processes and infrastructure.

• What Are the Key Terminology You Need to Know for Operational Resiliency (OR)?  Starting with "Six Key Terms Synonymous to "Disruption" You Need to Know for BCM?"
• What Exactly is Business Continuity Management?
• What Are the Key Terminology You Need to Know? Look for the terms in "BCMPedia: Operational Resilience in Wikipedia"?

If you are embarking on your OR journey and is starting from a "blank page", what should be the steps that you should be undertaking. 

• Do you have an existing OR framework and policy?
• Do you know who should be members of your OR team?

 If you are genuinely an OR newbie, you should start by gathering information from articles, case studies and analyses of recent crises affecting organizations inside and outside your industry. The key is to identify best-practice recommendations and any common pitfalls.

Read some of the crisis management articles on our LinkedIn Showcase (Operational Resilience).

Globally, related courses are specific to business continuity management at your home location.  You may look at the OR Institute's series of specialized OR courses if you find it useful.  

The quick question is, do I have the necessary skillset and know-how to do this job? What do I "not know"? How Do I Start My OR Learning Journey? (to insert link)

The institute has competency-based training leading to professional certification.  You may want to review the following OR courses to determine their relevance to your roles and prior knowledge.

Course Content Links to OR Institute Website With Pricing

• OR-200: Operational Resiliency Planner [Course Description] [Pricing] Course is an E-Learning Module.

• OR-300: Operational Resiliency Implementer [Course Description] [Pricing] [FAQ]

• OR-400: Operational Resiliency Manager [Course Description] [Pricing] [FAQ]

• OR-5000: Operational Resiliency Expert Implementer [Course Description] [Pricing]  [FAQ]

Note: For the latest course schedule, go to the respective [Course Description] and click [Course Schedule]

For those who are experienced and are seeking to progress in their career, it is time that you review and develop your learning road map that will accelerate both your knowledge, skillset and most importantly, your career.

Here are some of the related courses to be considered.  Take stock by reviewing "What is My OR Competency Level?". 

It is essential for you to know where you are "Know-Do-Manage" and where you aspire to reach or are required by the current OR role.

So What Exactly Is Your OR Role?

For those who are experienced and are seeking to progress in their career, it is time that you review and develop your learning road map that will accelerate both your knowledge, skillset and most importantly, your career. However, if you are already the OR Manager, what are the other roles within the BCM organisation? To find out the respective roles in "Operational Resiliency: What is My Role?"

Here are some of the four key and related roles to be considered:

• OR Manager: What are the Competency and Skill Needed to be Organization BCM Coordinator? 

• Business Unit OR Coordinator: What Does My Business Unit BCM Coordinator Need to Improve Their BCM Competency and Skill? 
• Recovery Team and Staff Members: How Do I Prepare and Train The Rest of My Organisation Staff Members on BCM? 
• Senior Management: What BCM Competency and Skill Should My Senior Management Have?

Operational Resiliency Certification provides you with the necessary verification that you have the knowledge and also the necessary experience to implement or manage the crisis management program.

The three levels of certification are shown below.  The types of crisis management certification include ORCP, ORCS and ORCE.

To elaborate on the requirement to attain your certification, you can find more information in "How to Obtain Your BCM Certification?"

The institute has published a specialized OR book called "A Manager’s Guide to ISO22301 Standard for Operational Resiliency."  You may want to get a  copy of this book from the OR Institute's store.

This book will provide an overview of how an OR framework is developed. The content is to advise the reader on the approach to implementing the operational resilience framework, principles and methodologies. Using the PDCA component as spelt out in the ISO Standard, this book provides a clear explanation of the standard and details on the “How-to” aspect in implementing your OR program, plans and procedures.   It also guides OR professionals new to ISO to implement and achieve its Operational Resiliency or OR. ISBN: 978-981-07-2512-9

Other Useful References

A list of the other references can be found in "What Are BCM References That Is Useful?"

If you have any questions, please feel free to write to us @ info@bcm-institute.org