The BDRP Process: Developing Your Disaster Recovery Strategy

This is the fourth in a series written by Guy Netaneli of 010 Data Protection. A partner and customer of Whipcord Edge, 010 helps businesses develop their plans and design technical solutions to support them.

A disaster recovery strategy is the actionable plan that translates risk management and business impact analysis (BIA) findings into concrete backup, recovery, and communication procedures. Developed during the strategy development phase of the BDRP process, it defines how a business restores data, systems, and operations within defined recovery time and point objectives (RTOs and RPOs) after a disruption.

Strategy development is where the theoretical aspects of risk management and business impact analysis BIA are translated into actionable plans. This phase begins with designing a comprehensive data backup strategy that ensures data availability and integrity. Businesses must decide on the frequency of backups, the types of data to be backed up, and the storage locations. Cloud-based solutions are often favoured for their scalability and reliability, providing secure off-site storage that can be accessed during a disaster.

In addition to data backup, the strategy development phase includes creating detailed disaster recovery procedures for each critical business function. These procedures outline the steps necessary to restore operations within the defined RTOs and RPOs. They should include instructions for system recovery, alternate site activation, and manual workaround processes. Clear, concise, and easily accessible documentation is essential to ensure that recovery teams can execute these procedures efficiently during a crisis.

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Communication is another vital component of the strategy development phase. Developing a clear disaster recovery communication plan ensures that all stakeholders are informed during a disaster. This includes establishing communication protocols for internal teams, external partners, customers, and regulatory bodies. Effective communication helps coordinate recovery efforts, maintain stakeholder confidence, and minimize the impact of misinformation during a disaster.

Guest Author

Guy Netaneli

010 Data Protection

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Frequently Asked Questions About a Disaster Recovery Strategy

What is a disaster recovery strategy?

A disaster recovery strategy is a documented plan that outlines how a business will restore its data, systems, and operations after a disruption such as a cyberattack, hardware failure, or natural disaster. It translates the findings of risk management and business impact analysis into practical steps covering data backup, system recovery, and stakeholder communication. A strong strategy defines specific recovery time objectives (RTOs) and recovery point objectives (RPOs) for each critical business function, so recovery teams know exactly how quickly systems must come back online and how much data loss is acceptable. Without a defined strategy, businesses often discover gaps in their recovery capabilities only after an incident occurs, when it is too late to correct them. Whipcord Edge works with partners like 010 Data Protection to help businesses design disaster recovery strategies that hold up under real-world pressure.

What is the difference between a disaster recovery strategy and a business continuity strategy?

A disaster recovery strategy focuses specifically on restoring IT systems, data, and infrastructure after a disruption, while a business continuity strategy covers the broader picture of keeping the entire organization operating, including staffing, facilities, and supplier relationships. The two are closely related and often developed together, but they solve different problems. A business continuity strategy might address where employees work if an office becomes unavailable, while the disaster recovery strategy addresses how the servers and applications those employees depend on get restored. Most mature organizations treat disaster recovery as a technical subset of their wider business continuity strategy. Both rely on the same foundational risk management and business impact analysis work, which is why they are typically planned in tandem rather than in isolation. For example, if a fire damages an office, business continuity planning covers relocating staff and notifying suppliers, while disaster recovery focuses on bringing backed-up servers and applications online at a secondary site.

What is included in a data backup strategy?

A data backup strategy defines how often data is backed up, which data types are prioritized, and where backup copies are stored. Most strategies specify backup frequency (hourly, daily, or continuous), retention periods, and a mix of on-site and off-site or cloud-based storage locations to protect against a single point of failure. Cloud-based backup solutions are widely used because they offer scalable, secure off-site storage that remains accessible even if a primary location is compromised. A thorough data backup strategy also accounts for data types with different sensitivity or recovery urgency; customer records and financial data, for example, often need faster recovery than archival files. Testing backups regularly is just as important as creating them, since untested backups can fail silently and leave a business without a usable copy when it matters most. Many businesses also incorporate the 3-2-1 rule, keeping three copies of data on two different media types with one copy stored off-site, as a simple benchmark for backup resilience.

What role do RTOs and RPOs play in disaster recovery procedures?

Recovery time objectives (RTOs) and recovery point objectives (RPOs) are the two metrics that shape every disaster recovery procedure. RTO defines the maximum acceptable time a system can be down before it must be restored, while RPO defines the maximum amount of data loss a business can tolerate, measured in time. Together, they determine backup frequency, infrastructure investment, and the specific recovery steps documented for each critical business function. A payment processing system might need an RTO of minutes and near-zero RPO, while an internal archive might tolerate a much longer recovery window. Setting these figures requires input from both IT and business leaders, since technical recovery capabilities must align with what each department can realistically tolerate during downtime. Insurance and compliance requirements can also influence acceptable RTOs and RPOs, particularly in regulated industries such as finance and healthcare. For a full breakdown of how these metrics are calculated and applied, see our guide on RTOs and RPOs.

Why is a disaster recovery communication plan important?

A disaster recovery communication plan ensures that employees, partners, customers, and regulators receive timely, accurate information during a disruption, preventing confusion and misinformation from compounding the crisis. It establishes who is responsible for communicating with each stakeholder group, which channels to use, and what information can and cannot be shared while recovery is underway. Without a defined plan, businesses often lose valuable time deciding who should speak to whom, while inconsistent messaging erodes stakeholder confidence. A well-documented communication plan also covers regulatory notification requirements, which can carry legal deadlines depending on the industry. Building this into the disaster recovery strategy from the outset means the business can focus on technical recovery instead of scrambling to coordinate messaging after the fact. A practical communication plan typically includes pre-approved message templates and a clear escalation chain, so the right person can update stakeholders within minutes rather than hours of an incident being confirmed.

How often should a business test its disaster recovery strategy?

Most organizations should test their disaster recovery strategy at least twice a year, with more frequent testing recommended for businesses running critical, high-availability systems. Testing validates whether documented RTOs and RPOs are actually achievable and surfaces gaps that only appear under real conditions, such as outdated contact lists or backup files that fail to restore properly. Testing methods range from tabletop walkthroughs, where teams talk through a scenario, to full failover simulations that actually shift operations to a backup environment. A disaster recovery strategy that is never tested is effectively unproven, regardless of how thorough it looks on paper. Many businesses schedule a lighter tabletop exercise each quarter alongside the twice-yearly full test, which keeps recovery teams familiar with their roles without the cost of a full simulation. Testing and maintenance is a distinct phase of the BDRP process; see our guide on disaster recovery plan testing and maintenance for a full breakdown.

What backup solutions support a strong disaster recovery strategy?

Cloud-based and immutable backup solutions are among the most widely used tools for supporting a disaster recovery strategy, since they provide secure, off-site storage that remains protected even if primary systems are compromised. Immutable backups, in particular, cannot be altered or deleted once written, which protects against ransomware attacks that specifically target backup files. Businesses typically combine several backup types, including full, incremental, and differential backups, to balance storage costs against recovery speed. Full backups copy all data every time, incremental backups capture only changes since the last backup, and differential backups capture changes since the last full backup; each option trades storage space against how quickly data can be restored. Choosing the right combination is one of the most technical decisions in the entire BDRP process. The right mix also depends on the RTOs and RPOs defined earlier in the process. For more on how immutable storage strengthens backup resilience, see our post on immutable backup storage.