# Write a business continuity plan for a critical process

A practical continuity plan covering impact, recovery targets, workarounds, and roles if a key process, site, or supplier fails.

- Topic: Projects & Operations
- Framework: Few-Shot
- Level: Standard
- Tags: Write, Plan, Fill-in Template
- Source: https://www.thinkwithprompt.com/prompts/write-a-business-continuity-plan-for-a-critical-process

## Prompt

```text
Help me write a business continuity plan for one critical process.

**Process:** [e.g. "order fulfillment", "payroll processing", "patient scheduling"]
**What it depends on:** [people, systems, sites, suppliers, data, equipment]
**What happens if it stops:** [impact on customers, revenue, compliance, safety - over 4 hours, 1 day, 1 week]
**Existing backups or workarounds:** [WHAT WE HAVE TODAY]
**Scenarios I'm most worried about:** [e.g. site unavailable, key system outage, loss of a key supplier, staff shortage]

Build the plan with these sections:
1. Process summary and owner.
2. Business impact: how quickly harm grows over time, and the maximum tolerable downtime.
3. Recovery targets: how fast it must be back (recovery time) and how much data/work we can afford to lose (recovery point). Mark proposals as [AGREE WITH LEADERSHIP].
4. Dependencies table: dependency | single point of failure? | backup | gap.
5. Response steps per scenario: first actions, workaround, who does what, how we return to normal.
6. Contact and call tree (roles, not names - I'll fill them in).
7. Testing: a simple tabletop exercise I can run in 60 minutes, and how often to review the plan.

End with the top 5 gaps ranked by risk, with a suggested fix and rough effort for each. Don't invent figures; use [ADD] where I haven't given data.
```

## What to fill in

- people, systems, sites, suppliers, data, equipment
- WHAT WE HAVE TODAY
- AGREE WITH LEADERSHIP
- ADD

Free to copy and use. From ThinkWithPrompt (https://www.thinkwithprompt.com/), a library of 2,663 curated AI prompts.
