Suppliers are important

Although it sounds like a cliché, providers are often the forgotten ones in the business continuity plans. Its often forgotten that there are services that are essential for our product and services to be delivered and that this services are provided by third parties,not depending on us. It's clear that, depending on the industry of our business, the dependency on providers would be different. So, also the measures we have to implement to grant continuity in their services and relicense in our business. Sometimes we have to establish a dual provider policy, in which we'll have a principal provider and a backup provider. In others, we'll have alternative methods to grant the service delivered by provider, but always will be required to make risk and impact analysis and determine the cost of the backup solution. 

Below I will give three examples of continuity of providers:

In the case of IT may be in which traditionally has taken into account the continuity of suppliers, mainly because, as I said in a previous entry, technological evolution has been ahead of business requirements. Any serious data centers has a generator that guarantees the supply of electricity, for example.
Another important role of providers in this area we can find in the fact that much has been outsourced services. In this case the dependence on suppliers is total and, as the sense of loss of control is inevitable, providers are required to delivers guarantees of service even in conditions in which the company would be unable to keep

The second example is framed in the field of distribution. It is what is called continuity of the supply chain, and is essential for any large establishment. Losses that can generate a bug in the supply chain in a department store can be worth millions, and that much of the business depends on the replenishment of the genre.

Finally, another example of importance of suppliers is in the financial sector, which, while focusing the attention of IT Service continuity, arguably could operate an office without receiving cash every morning undergoing the corresponding security company.
As a conclusion, importance of providers is vital in most business and should not be underestimated. Its necessary to look for the best plan to grant that a unavailability of the provider are not going to impact to the deliver of our services and products. .