The four T’s of Business Continuity Planning

Working with process development, I have found that I draw on the lessons I learned in business continuity planning during my studies. In particular, I have found that the actions to take in response to risks, also known as the four t’s, has been particularly useful. These four are:

• Treat
• Transform
• Tolerate
• Terminate

Under treat, you identify and implement ways to treat the risk. There are many approaches to this, such as providing training, adding redundancy, or repairing the system at risk. Under transform, you seek to transform the risk.

Under tolerate, you acknowledge the existence of the risk, and define the identified negative outcomes should the risk come to fruition as acceptable. Finally, under terminate, you replace or remove the risk, eliminating it entirely.

This is of course all more easily said than done, but being cognizant of the four approaches, and applying them as appropriate, can be important when you are faced with risks that could potentially harm the business.