Business Continuity For Dummies

Discovering What’s Important to Your Professional Services Business

In its most basic terms, your professional service firm requires a professional or consultant, a client, a means of external communication between the two, a contract or agreement and a place to meet. Of course, you also rely on the support of your team, the use of an IT system and a method for storing and retrieving contact details and original documentation. These key areas are what you need to protect through your BC.

More specifically, the fundamentals of your professional firm are based on providing a consistent and high level of guidance and building a strong working relationship between your staff and clients. The latter rely on you for professional guidance in the running of their business or an aspect of their personal life. Perhaps their own BC plan requires them to talk through, say, their accounts with a professional in order to better understand what they’re spending and where and how much money they can afford to put into contingency stock.

Providing this type of service to your customers relates to the reputation that forms around your business and determines the relationships that you have with your clients. The service extends beyond the time you spend with your clients in the office to maintaining client confidentiality and being available for clients to contact you when they need to.

We focus in this section on some specific aspects of concern to the professional service firm and show you how ...