Firms fail to weather the storm

Organisations in the engineering sector are failing to prepare for disruption, despite recording an increase in the level of upheaval caused by extreme weather conditions and high levels of people and skills loss.

According to research, published today by the Chartered Management Institute, organisations in the engineering sector are ‘blowing hot and cold’ when it comes to business continuity – they pay lip service to the importance of planning for disaster, but fail to make business resilience a reality.

The 2007 Business Continuity Management Survey, supported by the Cabinet Office and Continuity Forum, reveals that 19 per cent of organisations in the engineering sector were affected by extreme weather conditions in the 12 months to January 2007, an increase from less than 1 in 10, the previous year. In regional terms, the worst affected areas were Wales, where 21 per cent reported significant disruption, closely followed by Scotland and the South East.