Conference SIA - Continuam. Summary

With a relevant number of attendees, about 100 people, last 20th of March took place a conference sponsored by SIA Group and Continuam in which there were given an overview of the different activities that are taking place within the sector. The conference took place in the restaurant Loft39, at C/Velazquez in Madrid, calling for assistants at 12:00 and elongating until 16:00.

Introduction to the conference was provided by Enrique Palomares, CEO of SIA Group, who highlighted the commitment of this company for business continuity and the path along the last years, with both services consulting and automation tools, with SunGard AS.

First lecture was given by Daniel Blanco, BCM consultant at SIA Group. Under the title “Continuity, state of the art” Daniel gave an overview of the various standards and their evolution over time. He identified the main differences between BS25999-2 and ISO 22301 and highlighted the relevance of training and drills, specifically to provide visibility to the rest of the organization.

After Daniel, Juan Manuel Gil, CEO of F24, continued putting in value the relevance of notifications and how this notifications should change from traditional models (calls, SMS, emails, etc) to latest channels, dependent on the resources available for the employees of the organization.

In the third lecture Alfonso Costa, BCM Manager of Mutua Madrileña, stated which, from his point of view, are the cornerstones of business continuity within an organization:

• Alignment of objectives, mission and vision. The strategy of the organization must be aligned with the continuity management program.
• Governance model. Management should be involved. It is important to have a good sponsor.
• Visibility: must publicize the work done since continuity areas. You have to "come out". Testing is the largest showcase of business continuity
• Report: The record of what is becoming essential to show activity.

Then Pablo de Vera and Luis Sancho exposed the management structure of the business continuity used in BBVA, providing continuity of different committees depending on the severity of the incidents that occur: corporate continuity committee, country continuity committee and plan continuity committee. They gave a clear message which is the aim of his plans to ensure the service that BBVA provides to their customers and, therefore, their business.

 

Luis made it clear what is and is not a contingency BBVA, going more in detail about different scenarios to which BBVA had faced in recent years: pickets impeding access to a center, Hurricane Katrina and Ike, fire "neighbor" in the Windsor building, falling bank communications, critical power drop, the Icelandic volcano ash, etc..

 

To conclude the presentations, Tomas Martin, from CNPIC, outlined the activities being developed as a national critical infrastructure center, in collaboration with other European bodies: BUCOPCI standard, workgroup with AENOR, Smart grids: Spanish industrial safety platform, collaboration with coesga, among others.

 

To round off the event, it took place a panel discussion, moderated by Cesar Perez Chirinos (Continuam president) in which there was in an interesting representation: CNPIC, Bank of Spain, RSI, BSI, AENOR, Arsys and SIA. Cesar was moderating the table with different speakers that were answering the questions and gave their views on business continuity.

 

As a conclusion, the event was very well organized by SIA. Perhaps the time of lectures was extended in excess, but the speakers transmitted very pragmatic views, changing the discourse of IT by business discourse, closest to a comprehensive understanding of business continuity. The BC industry is maturing every day in Spain.