BFD S1EP16 â Fire Drill #15: Before You Realize There Is No Backup
Clean transcript (lightly edited: name spelling fixed, paragraphs added, a few false starts trimmed).
Good morning. This is Fire Drill 15: Before You Realize There Is No Backup. I'm attorney Tamsen Horton. Business moments are predictable. Panic is optional. And this is why we run the fire drill before the fire starts.
So, when my son was about eight, he gave me a title. He called me his backup buddy. And he was right. Everybody needs a backup buddy. Somebody who has your back and who steps in when you can't. And I've realized it's the exact same in business. So today I want to ask you: where are your backup buddies? And I mean two different kinds, team tech and team humans. The backup of your stuff, and the backup of your people. The backup of you.
Here is why I really, really care about this for you. In January of 2019, I was in the ICU for a week. I almost died. Legit story for other days. But my team tech, specifically Kajabi, kept running. It did exactly what it was supposed to do. It performed, like the employee was supposed to. I also had backup human buddies. Now, I didn't need them, because the team tech kept everything running. But if it had stretched much longer, or something had needed me, I would have been covered. And that is what I want for you. Not a dramatic plan, not an over-the-top orchestrated thing. Just really quiet knowledge that if you disappeared for a week, the business doesn't. Specifically in an unplanned circumstance.
Now, here is how this fire alarm goes off. Someone deletes the wrong file. Not a hacker, just a person on a Tuesday. Or a software update or a migration quietly wipes out or corrupts the data. Your hard drive dies, and the backup turns out to be on that same drive. Or you realize something really important, your client contracts, your course files, your email list, only ever existed in one location. This is not a good thing.
And the moment you find out is the exact moment someone says, "Don't worry, it's backed up somewhere. It's backed up over here, or it's backed up over there." That sentence has created more business migraines than you could ever imagine, because somebody didn't do the backup. It was like, "Oh, I'm running late, I'm not going to run it."
So, why do you have a smoke detector in your house? To warn you if there's a fire. Well, how do you find out in your business if there's a fire? I built you a smoke detector. It's 11 questions. It will take you about three minutes, and it will show you where your business is burning, where there are smoldering fires, and where there's fire, there is smoke. You need a smoke detector in your business for exactly the same reasons you have one in your house. So please go use the smoke detector.
When you hear the alarm, are you reacting or responding to it? Reacting looks like this. You assumed there was a backup. You never confirmed it. Nobody has ever tried to restore from a backup, so we've never done a drill. Critical records live in one place. The person who knows where everything is isn't available. It's like when mom goes down for the count. Not a good thing.
Responding is very calm. There is a real backup. You've run the routine. It's been tested. It's not "we set that up and never touched it." And there's a human who knows where things are and knows what to do should they need to step in. If mom gets sick, somebody else knows what to do.
So let's run this fire drill. D-R-I-L-L.
D: Don't react. Don't accept "it's probably backed up somewhere." Verify it before the crisis, not during a crisis. Run the drills so we're not panicked and frantic.
R: Record everything. A simple inventory: what's backed up, where, how often, and when you last tested it. That's the key. And "record" can be digital, but as I've said many times before, anything that could bring down our life, our finances, or our business, please keep a paper copy. That's typically passwords or access codes. Because with a digital lockout, if you have paper, you've got a backup. Some fires are really not one thing. The file, the backup, and the login can all go at once. And also add in the human column: who's the backup buddy for each critical task? You have to have a backup buddy.
I: Identify the real risk. What's truly irreplaceable, and what could you recreate with some effort? Your email list and signed contracts are quite often irreplaceable. Last month's social graphics are not. We can regenerate those, and it will probably make them better. Not mission critical.
L: Lead with calm. Check what's actually recoverable before you assume a total loss. Before you go off the deep end, let's double-check. Is mission critical still protected?
L: Lock in the lesson. Test it. Actually restore something. A backup you've never tested is like, "Well, we checked a box, but we never actually ran the plan." It's important.
If you're not sure what's only living in one place, what doesn't have a backup, ding, ding, ding: smoke detector. It shows you. Go use it. You can scan the QR code, or go to the link in the description. I've built it. All you have to do is run it.
You also want your fire extinguisher before the fire. We do not go to the store to buy a fire extinguisher when the house is on fire. Here we go.
Number one: the 3-2-1 rule. Three copies, on two kinds of storage, with one stored somewhere else. Not on the same laptop. Preferably not under the same user ID either.
Number two: test a restore. Pick one file and bring it back. These are tasks you can put on your calendar. I run them quarterly. I rotate them through. It's kind of a fun process.
Number three: keep that simple inventory. What's backed up, where is it, how often, and when was it last tested?
Number four: never rely on one device or on a platform's "we probably keep backups." Verify it. I can't say it enough. Just verify it.
Number five: name your human backup buddy. Someone who knows where the critical things live and can step in. They might not be able to do everything you do, but they can get it going again. They have to have access. In certain cases they need legal permissions to step in for you, which we'll go through in future fire drills and "life" fire drills. But again, no one person holding all the keys. What is the saying? Don't put all your eggs in one basket.
If the fire is already burning for you: stop making changes to the affected system right away. Check every recovery path: version history, cached copies, old exports, even old email attachments. Document what was lost and the real impact before you assume the worst. And use it as the trigger to finally build the fire drill.
Okay, you have the opportunity now to make your next right decision. One, do nothing, because you follow 3-2-1 and you've actually tested a restore. Two, put the drill in place, which is right if you've never once tried to restore from a backup you are assuming exists. Three, send this to a friend who's ever said, "I think that's backed up," or one you've watched go through a crisis.
Which brings me to your free homework for today. Pick the one thing your business couldn't survive losing. I'm a broken record here: it's usually going to be your email list or your signed contracts. Find every copy that exists. Then name the one person who could step in if you vanished for a week. Again, this is not planning to take time off the business. This is: you went to the ER, you're now in the ICU. What happens?
Everybody needs a backup buddy. Run the smoke detector. Scan the code, or go to the description. It's very easy to find. Business moments are predictable. Panic is optional. Run the fire drill before the fire alarm goes off.
