Not all crises test an organisation the same way. Some hit your operations directly — cyber attacks, technology outages, supply chain shocks. These are where resilience is critical: they impact the systems, data and delivery that are essential for operational continuity. A key part of crisis preparedness is understanding your Minimum Viable Company (MVC) — the small set of activities you can’t afford to lose, and your outage tolerance for each one — how long you can run without it before real damage sets in — and the critical order of recovery, so the most critical elements are protected or restored first.

An organisation is a web of technology, people, suppliers, data and physical assets. In good times the whole machine runs as one — and you might not think to ask which parts must keep turning when the shock arrives.

A cyber attack, a technology outage, or a failure deep in the supply chain. Prevention has been bypassed; response begins. Invoke the crisis management plan, contain the damage — and prioritise operations that are part of your Minimum Viable Company (MVC).

Your primary focus is on the systems, data and delivery that keep the organisation viable — financially, operationally and strategically — everything else is secondary.

The essential services, processes and functions, identified and agreed long before the crisis: tier-0 IT and data, the suppliers and channels that sustain minimal service, crisis governance, and the cash flow that keeps it all turning.

Where systems cannot be recovered at once, people carry the load through tested manual workarounds. Roles and responsibilities were agreed in advance — and someone is always at the wheel.

Minimal service levels held, cash flow protected, customer trust preserved. An organisation that has mapped its dependencies and tested its plan is crisis ready — it can respond faster and adapt better than one improvising in the dark.

With the MVC stable, attention turns to recovery: critical data restored from clean backups, functions brought back from manual workarounds, people returned to their seats.

The underpinning technology is rebuilt and the rest of the business recovered — system by system, supplier by supplier — each reconnection tested for integrity before it is re-integrated.

Full functionality restored, profitability returning. Organisations that define, test and embed their Minimum Viable Company (MVC) before the shock do not merely endure disruption — they emerge more agile and more resilient.