A critical business system (or a critical business app, as they are more commonly known) is any app or system that’s necessary for a business’s continuity. If a critical system were interrupted, then a business’s normal operations would cease until the said system was resumed.
If you are a business owner, then it is important to educate yourself about critical business systems, so that you can keep yours running. Even a minor interruption could cost you a lot of money.
This post will tell you all about them, including what some examples are, and what you need to know.
Critical Systems
As mentioned in this post’s introduction, a critical system or application is a piece of software that’s essential to the smooth running of a business’s operations. However, something you also need to know is that there are different categories, or priorities, of critical systems. They are mission-critical, business-critical, and non-critical. If a mission-critical system was interrupted, then a business’s operations would completely cease (an example of this could be a point-of-sale system). A business critical system is still important, but not as important, and operations won’t cease due to an interruption. Non-critical interruptions may still have an impact, but they won’t be as severe also.
Types of Critical System
ERP Software
One common type of software that’s considered by many businesses to be mission-critical is ERP software. If you have not encountered it before, then ERP software is essentially just a type of software that’s used for the management of day-to-day business activities, like project management, risk management, and even supply chain management. Obviously, if your company’s project, risk, and supply chain management systems failed, your business would be in a lot of trouble. Therefore, this software is without a doubt critical. Something that makes it even more important is that this one piece of software allows you to manage many different business processes. This means that if it fails, then you will lose access to a variety of different things. If you use it, it is essential that you keep it in working order, at all times.
Point-of-sale
Another example of mission-critical software is point-of-sale software. Point-of-sale software is how most businesses accept payment. If a company’s POS system stops working, then this means that it won’t be able to make any sales. If they cannot make sales, then all profits stop. Also, point-of-sale software is sometimes used for inventory tracking, too. This means if it stops, a business could lose all information about its current inventory and stock, which will prevent them from making any sales where they accept cash, causing massive problems.
Messaging Apps
A lot of businesses rely on messaging apps. Messaging apps are another type of mission-critical software. This is especially true if a business’s employees are all working from home. If one’s staff are working from home, then not being able to communicate with each other means that all work stops. Also, messaging apps are sometimes used to communicate with customers and collaborators. If a messaging app is used for these purposes, then it will also mean that all sales and collaborations will stop too. Thankfully, messaging apps seldom fail and are very reliable. If they did fail though, lots of businesses would be in trouble.
Identifying Systems
While the systems mentioned here so far are indeed all mission-critical to many businesses, it should also be noted that what’s critical to one, is not critical to another. Different businesses have different critical apps and systems. If you are a business owner, then you should take time to examine all of your business’s apps and systems and work out which ones are most important.
Once you have identified the most important apps and systems, you can then begin prioritizing them according to importance, i.e., by ranking them mission-critical, business-critical, and non-critical.
Defense Lines
You can’t always guarantee that your business’s apps and systems are going to work. If you have identified specific things as being mission and business-critical, then you need to take steps to protect them against failure. One way of doing this is by using cloud software and systems, instead of downloadable software. When things are hosted on the cloud, it’s a lot less likely that they are going to fail. Also, when you use the cloud, you can access them from different devices, which means that if one device fails, you can use another.
As a business owner, it is essential that you identify which apps and systems are critical to your business’s success. If a critical operation fails, it can be disastrous. Make sure to set up defence lines (such as cloud computing) to protect your systems, so your business’s systems are never interrupted. You can also create an effective ad for your business. And, can showcase your business with more audience.