ISO 22301 is the recognised international standard for Business Continuity Management Systems (BCMS), published by the International Organisation for Standardization (ISO).
In a world where cyberattacks, data breaches and natural disasters can interrupt business continuity and quickly damage reputation, organisations and businesses need to implement, maintain and keep refining their business continuity management system (BCMS). ISO 22301 certification of their continuity management ensures they are doing so.
The ISO 22301 business continuity management standard, crucially helps organisations identify and prioritise threats. It allows them to implement their business continuity management system effectively so they are ready to respond to and recover from incidents with the least disruption to business.
Studies have shown that almost 1 in 5 organisations experience significant business disruptions every year. Therefore, a robust and resilient organisation is one that can change with the times, has an understanding of where its vulnerabilities are and have plans in place to mitigate risk as well as respond if it needs to do so. Compliance or certification to ISO 22301 business continuity management allows your organisation to achieve all of the above in a straightforward and structured manner.
In 2019, a version of the standard was set out as ISO 22301:2019. This focused on ‘societal security’. It specified requirements to ‘plan, establish, implement, operate, monitor, review, maintain and continually improve a documented business continuity management system’.
The aim of ISO 22301:2019 was to protect against, reduce the likelihood of occurrence, prepare for, respond to, and recover from disruptive incidents as and when they arise.