Message Center: Planning Updates
Introduction
Stay informed with critical BC&R updates, system alerts, upcoming deadlines, and event announcements. Visit weekly for the latest information and planning-related news as it’s made available.
August 7, 2025: Contingency Strategies – Keeping your Unit going during any disruption
Contingency Strategies are actions that are developed, maintained, and activated for unique circumstances based on how the disruption has impacted your Unit; including the overarching categories for Loss of Key Staff, Loss of Facility, Loss of Technology, and Loss of Vendor. These are strategies that should be designed to ensure the continuous delivery of the most essential operations, and provide clear guidance for staff on how to transition operations to non-standard structuring.
It is important to note that Contingency Strategies are not intended to support the resumption of day-to-day processes and may not allow the unit to fully conduct services at full efficiency. Instead, these are powerful tools to allow, at minimum, operational processes to occur within the highest acceptable impact parameters.
When evaluating possible strategies some things to think through may include:
- Do we have up-to-date contact lists and various methods to reach staff (text, email, Teams etc.)?
- Is there a list of pre-approved alternate vendors that could quickly provide services if vendors were unavailable or unable to fulfill their agreements?
- Have we worked with other UIC units/departments on shared space agreements, or identified where we would go in the event spaces were unavailable tomorrow?
- Including where research and approved laboratory spaces may be provided to accommodate relocation.
- What would need to be in our “go-kit” for staff that may have to quickly transition operations to an alternate site or virtual operations?
- Including items such as mobile hotspots, backup computer monitors, printed documents and procedures etc.
- What would be the possible services or operations that could temporarily be suspended, and what staff could be reassigned to support alternate tasks?
- Including maintained standard operating procedures (SOPs) for our most essential processes.
June 24, 2025: Ask Us Anything-Collaborate and Engage with OPR and your fellow planners on BC&R
OPR will be hosting an “Ask Us Anything” open session on Monday, June 30th at 1:00pm. We promise that this will not just be another training, slide show heavy timeshare presentation, or lecture. This will be a moment for us to be available and ready to field any groundballs or homeruns that UIC’s BC&R Users may want to hit our way.
Bring any questions, concerns, comments, best practices, or advice that could be beneficial for your fellow planners! OPR is ready to show a quick demo, provide clarifications, or put our minds together to provide practical, meaningful and timely planning advice.
Unable to make it to the conversation? No worries! This session will be recorded and posted for all to review. If you are looking to attend but did not receive an invitation, please contact us at ready@uic.edu or contact your assigned planner directly.
Grab your virtual front-row tickets today!
June 16, 2025: How Long Can You Wait? Understanding Your Recovery Time Objective
What is an RTO?
A Recovery Time Objective (RTO) defines the maximum acceptable amount of time that a critical academic, research, or administrative function can be disrupted before significant negative impacts occur. It establishes the target timeframe for restoring operations and is a cornerstone of UIC’s continuity planning efforts.
Who sets the RTO?
RTOs are determined by each college, school, department, or administrative unit, based on your understanding of what is operationally essential. These values directly influence how your unit prioritizes recovery efforts following an interruption, guiding decision-making when resources such as staffing, space, IT systems, or funding are limited.
Why are RTOs important?
Within the Business Impact Analysis (BIA) process, RTOs appear across all core elements, from identifying Critical Functions (e.g., course delivery, grant processing, patient services, lab operations) to evaluating Dependencies such as IT systems, key personnel, or specialized equipment. A clear, well-informed RTO ensures your unit can maintain continuity of mission-critical services in line with UIC’s institutional resilience goals.
Where should we start?
If you’re uncertain about how to establish an RTO, begin with the Impact Analysis section of your unit’s Critical Function profile. This exercise assesses how delays affect five key impact areas: academic continuity, research integrity, health and safety, financial loss, and reputational risk. This analysis will help align expectations with measurable consequences over time.
Need guidance?
The BC&R system will generate a Calculated RTO based on your responses to the Impact Analysis. This feature supports your evaluation of whether your Requested RTO is realistic and aligned with broader recovery priorities. For additional guidance, please consult the UIC Business Continuity & Resilience Methodology Manual, or reach out to the BCR team for tailored support.
June 13, 2025: Cloud Outages Disrupt Services Nationwide — Reinforcing the Need for Continuity Planning at UIC
On June 12, a major Google Cloud outage disrupted services across multiple platforms, including OpenAI, Shopify, and others. Simultaneously, a widespread internet disruption affected access to several key services such as Spotify, Amazon, and critically, iBox impacting UIC faculty and staff who were unable to access cloud-stored files during the workday.
This incident highlights our growing dependence on cloud-based tools and underscores the urgent need to establish manual workarounds, redundancies, and contingency protocols to ensure continuity of operations during outages.
While we continue to advance our digital infrastructure, events like this are a strong reminder: Resilience depends on preparation.
Stay prepared!
June 10, 2025: EM vs. BC&R Explained
Emergency Management (EM) at UIC is centered on immediate response to events that pose a threat to life, safety, or campus operations. Whether it’s a building flood, active shooter, severe weather, or other disruptive incident, EM leads the coordination of time-sensitive actions designed to stabilize the situation and safeguard people and property. This includes activating the Campus Emergency Operations Center (CEOC), deploying incident command protocols, and supporting first responders, such as Police and Fire, in managing on-the-ground operations. The focus is on urgent decision-making and real-time coordination to minimize harm and restore baseline safety.
Business Continuity & Resilience (BC&R), on the other hand, is about preserving the university’s critical functions over time, before, during, and after a disruption. BC&R planning identifies mission-critical operations (e.g., instruction, clinical care, research continuity, payroll, IT infrastructure, etc.) and develops mitigation strategies to sustain or rapidly restore them in the face of operational interruptions. Using concepts like Business Impact Analysis (BIA), Recovery Time Objectives (RTOs), and alternate work arrangements, BC&R ensures the university remains functional even when conditions are compromised. While EM manages the crisis, BC&R ensures UIC’s critical functions endure and recover, enabling institutional resilience beyond the emergency itself.
June 3, 2025: Understanding Critical Functions: One Size Doesn’t Fit All
We’re addressing a recurring question during the Business Impact Analysis (BIA) and Business Continuity Planning (BCP) process.
How many Critical Functions should a department have?
Answer: There’s no fixed or “correct” number of Critical Functions for a unit or department. Remember, a Critical Function is the core activity or service performed by a unit/department that, if disrupted, would impact your College’s / Major Admin units’ ability to continue operations, deliver essential products, and fulfill its mission at a sufficient level. For some units/departments there may be more Critical Functions based on the size and extent of your operations. Even if your unit or department has only a few Critical Functions, they may serve as vital links in the university’s broader ecosystem, functions that others across UIC rely on to fulfill their own missions. The key is to clearly identify how your daily operations contribute to sustaining UIC’s core mission, academic excellence, and institutional resilience.
Take a look at our BIA Critical Functions example list found in our Practical Examples and Planning References section.
May 21, 2025: NEW Step-by-Step User Manual Presentation - Your Plan Development Companion
As part of our continued support, we’ve added another new resource to help you navigate the Riskonnect portal. Our detailed, screen-by-screen guide walks you through each step, from logging in to answering every question with clarity through helpful visuals. This guide will explain what each question asks and how it contributes to your overall plan development. View it now under the User Manual section or click here. With this new support document, you’ll have the clarity and visual direction needed to efficiently build and refine your continuity plan, step by step.
May 15, 2025: Departmental Planning at the Ground Level for UIC's Resilience Strategy
Now that we’re off and running, we’re diving into departmental planning at the most detailed level to ensure that each unit’s business continuity and disaster recovery strategies are fully optimized. Operational knowledge resides at the ground level, within the day-to-day functions, processes, and faculty/staff who make each department run smoothly. This granular focus allows us to capture those key insights that often go unnoticed but are vital for building a resilient strategy.
Why is this level of detail important? By addressing the unique aspects of each department, we ensure that every piece of UIC’s operational puzzle is aligned and prepared to support the larger EOPG crisis management strategy. These department-specific plans will feed into the university’s broader resilience optimization strategy, enhancing our ability to coordinate, respond, and recover during major crises. Through this detailed, department-level work, we build the foundational readiness that will drive our macro-level crisis management effectiveness across the entire university.
May 14, 2025: UIC's Operational Continuity Sprint - Full Launch Begins
UIC’s 12-Week Sprint to Operational Continuity is officially underway, and we’re charging ahead! With dedicated planner support and an abundance of resources available to you, we’re set to collaboratively build, refine, and finalize our continuity plans.
As the global emphasis on operational resilience grows, we must ask ourselves: Are we fully prepared for when challenges emerge? A key first step is establishing a well-trained crisis management team that ensures our business continuity and disaster recovery plans are consistently maintained and ready for action. This is not a one-time effort, it’s an ongoing process of continuous testing, scenario simulations, and refinements to ensure that our response protocols stay sharp. Additionally, by validating our technology infrastructure through simulated outages, we can identify any weaknesses and ensure that UIC’s systems can sustain operations during any disruption. By prioritizing our people, process, and technology, we can fortify UIC’s resilience and maintain our ability to respond effectively in times of need.