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An interview with Judith Eckles, Marketing Executive and Principal at Judith Eckles & Partners. e-GUIDE( Judith Eckles: Remember FUD? Fear, uncertainty and doubt? That's how disaster recovery was marketed in the '90s and that's how it was covered by the trade press. The only time the media took notice of the industry (with the one exception of the Disaster Recovery Journal) was when a disaster occurred. And then it was only the trade press that was interested. ComputerWorld. Information Week. And the banking and insurance trade press, publications like American Banker, I think because the financial services industry has always been in the forefront of the industry. The general and/or business press didn't cover disaster recovery at all.
Eckles: It's not that surprising when you consider the limited importance corporations placed on disaster recovery at that time. The Disaster Recovery industry was very different in the early 1990s. Mainframes were the platform of choice and disasters were few and far between. Disaster Recovery focused on backing up and recovering financial information. A recovery that took two weeks was acceptable. For the most part, the C-level executives took no notice of their corporate DR plans. Not even the CIOs gave DR much consideration. Senior executives, by and large, are can-do, positive people. They are always up for a challenge, willing to take "reasonable" risks. The early messages of disaster recovery were viewed as negative, counter-productive. When disasters happened and were covered, it was events like the Loma Prieta Earthquake, the Chicago Flood and the first World Trade Center bombing. Trade press reporters covered these events, addressed the technical aspects of the recovery efforts and moved on. The news media covered every aspect except disaster recovery. And the executive readers of these publications just shrugged and said "not on my watch" or "that can't happen to me."
Eckles: Yes and no. Things did change because in the mid '90s, distributed processing started to become more prevalent. Information became increasingly important and business units outside of finance started relying more heavily on access to information. As more people became responsible for protecting information, trade press editors and reporters recognized potential new readers and added disaster recovery to their media calendars. Contingency Planning and Management magazine entered the trade press arena as another publication focused entirely on Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity. On the other hand, although DR and BC were slightly more important, the technology press treated business continuity as a once-a-year feature-unless an event occurred making it topical. During hurricane season along the East Coast a daily paper or a TV station would occasionally run a story on how businesses could or should prepare to protect themselves. The idea that a business could be affected was just beginning to seep into public consciousness. Business Continuity companies leveraged the dot com boom to pique the interest of the business press. But rather than covering it as business continuity, reporters examined how companies were ensuring Internet Access or uptime. During Hurricane Floyd in September 1999, corporate executives from the big three DR/BC firms-SunGard, IBM and, at the time, Comdisco-started appearing on cable news shows to talk about the importance of the reliability and availability of information. They marketed business continuity as a business necessity. And this wasn't just marketing hype. As more and more people began using ATM cards and buying on-line, eBay and Amazon became household words. Consumers were using technology in their everyday lives. But no matter how creative the service providers were at pitching the importance of business continuity, the news media still only covered business continuity issues during or after "events." And then there was Y2k .
Eckles: Without question, Y2K raised the visibility of business continuity both in the technology press and in the executive suite. Here was a challenge that needed to be met head on: the Executive Suite had to turn to the IT department for solutions, with disaster recovery as a back up. Y2K remediation programs, disaster recovery and business continuity were widely covered in the technology press but, with very few exceptions, they still weren't covered as business issues in the general news media. And when the Y2K "event" turned out to be a "non-event," that was the end of that.
Eckles: Again my answer is yes and no. And then yes, once more. Yes, with all that paper blowing around and so many Wall Street companies impacted, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Time, Business Week-all of the major news organizations-felt compelled to write something about disaster recovery. I don't think Operational Resilience could be called a household term, but it certainly is increasingly well known in the business world, particularly at financial institutions. Then the government jumped in, examining issues like duplicate facilities and redundant people and communications issues. Politicians talked about the issues, and the politicians and their proposed regulations were covered-for a while. Unfortunately, the practice of business continuity didn't become an on-going topic of importance. And as a subject for news stories, frankly, it probably never will. And again, yes. How do we define our "industry" today? What is getting covered, although not disaster recovery or business continuity, is the next big thing and perhaps most important aspect of the Information Age . Eckles: The security, reliability and availability of the information that fuels every company around the globe. Without information, there is no business continuity. In fact, without information, there is no business. And the importance of information has finally gained the attention of the boardroom and the executive suite. And no wonder! Today's executives are faced with financial debacles like Enron, MCI/Worldcom, Global Crossing, Tyco; regulatory changes like Sarbanes-Oxley, HIPPA, Gramm-Leach-Bliley and the USA Patriot Act; concerns over privacy and security, security, security. Keeping information secure, reliable and available doesn't happen by accident. But talking about "active monitoring" or "security infrastructure" doesn't communicate business value to your organization. By articulating in clear, concise business terms the value of information security, reliability and/or availability and how individually and together they are integral to maintaining a healthy, viable resilient enterprise, business continuity practitioners and vendors may yet be able to catch the attention and the coverage of the new media they deserve . About our Expert Ms. Judith Eckles is a veteran marketing communications professional with special expertise in the business continuity marketplace. She was a founding member of the Disaster Recovery Journal's Editorial Advisory Board, chairing the board for two years, and was also one of the first members of DRJ's Executive Committee. She was the first vendor representative on the DRII board of directors, serving for two years and advising the board on marketing initiatives. After working at SunGard for nearly 14 years, Judith founded Judith Eckles & Partners, where she helps companies create a compelling brand presence and turn it into increased revenue. With hands on experience in brand development and marketing communications tactical execution, Judith Eckles & Partners delivers an integrated, sustainable approach that gets your company's message heard and remembered. Your communications challenges - solved! Call Judith at 610.828.6017 or email her at judith@juditheckles.net.
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