Business impact analysis (BIA)

Working out which processes matter most and how fast they must recover.

A BIA identifies critical business processes, the impact of losing them over time, and the resources they depend on. It sets recovery priorities, RTOs and RPOs, and is the foundation of the continuity plan.

On the exam

The BIA comes before choosing recovery strategies. Business process owners, not IT, are the key source of information.

Related terms

Recovery time objective (RTO)How quickly a system must be running again after a disruption.
Recovery point objective (RPO)The most data, measured in time, the business can afford to lose.
Hot, warm and cold sitesAlternate processing sites, from ready-to-run to an empty room.

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