Director: Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery - (6843) at Cape Peninsula University of Technology

Job Purpose

• The Director: Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery is responsible for the development of the Business Continuity Strategy, programmes and plans to support response, develop resilience and enable recovery from events that disrupt Institutional operations. The Director: Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery will be responsible for developing a framework and methodology that will enable the Institution to manage all business continuity life cycle activities including risk assessment, business impact analysis, implementation testing and review. Such frameworks and methodologies will result from the study and identification of trends across a diverse range of fields and empower the University to identify potential existential threats and proactively develop mitigation strategies and contingency plans that will be activated when such threats become imminent. These fields include but are not limited to international; national and institutional trends relating to the higher education landscape; energy & infrastructure; climate change; healthcare and epidemiology; human dynamics and civil disobedience; socio-economic trends; and nutrition and food security. The mitigation strategies are both intended to prevent the occurrence of such threats by ensuring a long-term plan is in place; as well as protecting the institution if it becomes evident that such a threat is unavoidable.

Job Knowledge, Skills and Experience

• Master’s degree in one of the disciplines related to the management of business continuity and disaster recovery operations, e.g. Operations Management; Industrial Engineering; Quality Management or Project Management.
• 7 years relevant technical experience of which 2 years was management level in a higher education environment.
• Relevant Business Continuity, Disaster Recovery, Risk or Audit certifications preferred. (One or more certifications MBCP, CBCP, ABCP, CRISC, CISA)

Key Performance Areas / Principal Accountabilities

Strategic Development

• Development of effective and efficient business continuity strategies, policies, procedures, protocols, and governance structures;
• Develop and manage a conducive environment for the implementation and periodic review of the institutional business continuity strategy;
• Develop relevant policies on the management of business continuity in the institution;

Development of Business Continuity Platforms

• Create and manage institutional business continuity platforms, structures, committees or other forms of institutional governance in the realm of business continuity;
• Accurate, continuous, and timeous detection of any existential threats to the continuity of the institution’s operations;
• Create and coordinate cluster teams for the management of identified business continuity threats;

Risk and Threat management

• Updates risk analyses and business impact analyses for any existential threats to the continuity of the institution’s operations;
• Scan international, national and institutional trends in order to identify existential threats to the normal operational functions of the institution on the short-; medium-; and long-term;
• Updates disaster recovery or contingency plans on the short-; medium-; and long-term for any existential threats to the continuity of the institution’s operations on both the overall level, as well as for the various functions within in the organisation;
• Fully functioning cluster teams for any existential threats to the continuity of the institution’s operations that are knowledgeable to advise Executive Management; Divisions; or Deans within their respective fields of expertise and manage interventions as required;
• Provide oversight of all risk analyses and business impact analyses of identified threats;

Operational Management & Special projects

• Create and maintain a project execution environment that is able to create and manage an effective response to these matters in order to ensure continuity in critical operations or any other matter that may have a material effect on the normal operations of the institution as directed by Executive Management or the DVC: Operations.
• Create an environment within which business continuity projects and interventions as required by Executive Management are executed.
• Ensure that effective operational plans and measures are put in place to avoid the realization of these threats
• Develop and periodically review contingency plans for the short-; medium-; and long-term for the mitigation of identified threats;
• Execute special projects to mitigate these threats if they become unavoidable including guidance on the management of critical operations that require intervention during times of crisis;

Development and maintenance of recovery plan and procedures.

• Develops and maintains a business recovery plan and procedures, reviews, revises, and expands existing plans and protocols.
• Conducts assessments for various departments and functions, analysing potential business impact of unpredictable interruptions such as natural disasters, security breach and legal claims, student and labour unrest.
• Identifies and implements recovery operations and methods to allow the university to function at limited or partial capacity in the event that part or all infrastructure is damaged or destroyed or declared dysfunctional.
• Develops and provides staf training on risk management and disaster recovery.

Executive Support

• Provide support and guidance to Executive Management on reputational matters consequent to a business continuity threat;
• Provide support and guidance to Executive Management, Divisions, Faculties and Departments on all business continuity matters on the institutional level or that may be relevant or peculiar to any specific part of the organisation; and encourages research output

Research

• A research area that continuously studies best practices in business continuity management and the underlying fields of expertise; produces new knowledge; and encourages application of researched improvement.
• Develop and manage a research back-office in which knowledge and intelligence on business continuity is curated and where feasible academic research output on the above is produced.
• Develop models to assist the university in building resilience against adversities in varied forms.

Management reports

• Write reports for Executive Management on regular basis
• Make presentation to other management platforms
• Review progress reports from Institutional business continuity committees and other platforms.

Competencies

• A thorough understanding of the higher education landscape on both the international and national levels;
• A thorough understanding of the institution’s operations and the core issues surrounding the continuity of it’s operations;
• The ability to remain objective and focused during a crisis and, due to the nature of business continuity, excellent crisis management skills if the situation requires it;
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills;
• The ability to lead and ensure cohesion in a diverse team of experts coming from various divisions, faculties or departments within a project environment;
• The ability to interact with external and internal stakeholders on all levels of the organisation; and
• The ability to convert, or create opportunities for the conversion, of knowledge produced during business continuity management, into academic research output.