What Business Continuity Can Learn from Software Development

Software development and product management are disciplines built on iteration, testing, and resilience. They thrive on cycles of design, review, and improvement. Business continuity (BC) shares the same goals – ensuring systems and people can withstand disruption – but often struggles with similar pitfalls. By examining practices from software, we can sharpen how organisations prepare for disruption, and highlight the value of trusted external partners in creating environments where failure is not a risk, but a learning opportunity.

Segregation of Duties

In software, developers don’t test their own code. Independent QA ensures objectivity and reduces blind spots. In BC, however, professionals often both write the plan and exercise it, which risks internal bias. Even when testing is segregated, there’s still an element of “marking your own homework” – testers know the organisation too well, and expectations shape outcomes.

Lesson: Build independent review loops into continuity planning. External partners like Tapping Frog can facilitate exercises that challenge assumptions, ensuring plans are tested from fresh perspectives.

Disaster Recovery: Simpler is Better

In technology, disaster recovery (DR) is most effective when failover and recovery are simple, repeatable, and automated. Reluctance to trigger DR often stems from complexity – if recovery feels fragile, leaders hesitate. The same applies in BC: hesitation to act can cost precious time.

Case Study: Cayman Earthquake

During the Cayman earthquake, our team faced exactly this dilemma. I was ready to fail over – confident the process would complete in seconds and protect communications infrastructure if the situation worsened. But the decision was shared: I held 50%, the CTO the other 50%. His hesitation wasn’t about the failover itself, nor the principal recovery, but a single extra step involving one document dataset. The step was simple, but prior experience with lengthy document migrations across continents coloured his judgement. That memory of delay led to reluctance, even though the failover process itself was proven.

The earthquake was over quickly, and by the time we would have conferred, the moment to act had passed. The key was that I was aware of the reluctance, and so – whilst I had the tools at my fingertips to trigger action – I was then also reluctant.

This episode highlights three lessons. First, full-scenario exercising, incorporating the entire DR cycle, is essential to build confidence. Second, decision-making authority must be clear and actionable in real time. Too many moving parts in the decision tree dampen response. And third, it underscores the difference between expected and unexpected threats. Hurricanes were an expectation in Cayman – even rapid development provides hours to confer and make collective decisions. Earthquakes, by contrast, were unexpected. They arrive without warning, and demand action in seconds. Continuity planning often prepares us well for the most likely scenarios, but it is the unexpected shocks – those that come with no time to confer – that trip organisations up.

Testing and Verification

Even simple DR mechanisms fail if they’re not tested. In BC, hesitation to act often comes from uncertainty: “Will this actually work?” Decision-makers want proof before committing.

Lesson: Regular, verified exercises build confidence. External facilitators create safe environments where failure is not a setback but a positive step toward refinement. At Tapping Frog, we emphasise that testing is not about proving perfection – it’s about uncovering weaknesses and strengthening resilience.

Continuous Improvement: Bugs and Features

In product management, unresolved bugs or feature requests get forgotten. In BC, identified improvements often languish unimplemented.

Lesson: Treat BC gaps like bug tickets – log them, prioritise them, and resolve them quickly, then re-test. External partners can help organisations maintain discipline, ensuring improvements are acted upon rather than lost in the noise of daily operations.

Version Control

Software thrives on version control: every change is tracked, rolled back if needed, and documented. BC plans often lack this discipline, leading to confusion over which version is current.

Lesson: Adopt version control principles for BC documentation – clear numbering, changelogs, and rollback options. External partners can provide structured frameworks and ensure organisations always know which plan is live.

Managing Third‑Party Dependencies

Software projects can stall when over‑reliant on external libraries or vendors. BC plans can fail if they depend too heavily on third parties without clear risk management.

Lesson: Map dependencies, assess vendor resilience, and build contingencies for external failures. Partners like Tapping Frog can help organisations identify hidden dependencies and stress-test them in exercises.

Conclusion

Software development and product management show us that resilience is not just about having a plan – it’s about testing, simplifying, iterating, and managing dependencies. Business continuity can borrow these lessons to move beyond static documents, becoming a living system of preparedness and confidence.

The Cayman earthquake experience illustrates the stakes: hesitation can arise from technical complexity, prior scars, fragmented authority, or simply the shock of an unexpected event. By building the response, testing and re-testing it, and then giving clear authority and support to trigger that response as a precaution rather than waiting for absolutes, organisations can act decisively when seconds matter.

Trusted external partners play a critical role in this journey. At Tapping Frog, we provide environments where organisations can test their continuity plans without fear of failure. In fact, failure is welcomed – it’s the most valuable outcome of an exercise, because it reveals what needs to be refined. By embracing this mindset, organisations can build continuity strategies that are not only documented, but proven, resilient, and ready for both the expected and the unexpected.

Dare to do better.