--- title: "Preparing for a Business Impact Analysis: A Practical Checklist" description: Use this practical pre-BIA checklist to define scope, participants, impact criteria, pre-work, schedules, and expectations before starting your analysis. --- [MHA Consulting Blog | Roadmap to Resiliency](https://mha-it.com/blog) # [Preparing for a Business Impact Analysis: A Practical Checklist](https://mha-it.com/blog/preparing-for-a-bia) Written by [Richard Long](https://mha-it.com/blog/author/richard-long) | Oct 10, 2017, 12:40:25 PM **A successful business impact analysis starts before the first interview. Before collecting data, define what the BIA needs to accomplish, which parts of the organization are in scope, who needs to participate, what terminology and impact criteria everyone will use, and what information participants should prepare in advance.** You do not need to make the preparation complicated. You do need enough structure that every participant is answering the same basic questions and understands what the organization is trying to learn from the BIA. **Pre-BIA checklist** 1. Define what the BIA needs to accomplish. 2. Set the scope. 3. Choose the BIA approach. 4. Define common terminology, time bands, and impact criteria. 5. Identify the right participants. 6. Gather useful information before the interviews. 7. Prepare the questionnaire or pre-work. 8. Set expectations with participants. 9. Build the interview and review schedule. 10. Define how results will be validated and approved. ## 1. Define What the BIA Needs to Accomplish Start with the outcome, not the questionnaire. What does the organization need the BIA to help determine? Typical objectives may include: - understanding how disruption affects important business processes over time - identifying recovery priorities - understanding critical systems, data, suppliers, people, facilities, and internal dependencies - establishing business recovery requirements - identifying gaps between business needs and current recovery capability - providing better inputs for continuity plans and recovery strategies Write the objective down before the project starts. If the purpose is unclear, the BIA can quickly become a large data-collection exercise with no clear connection to the decisions that follow. ## 2. Set the Scope Decide what the BIA will cover before sending questionnaires or scheduling interviews. Define: - which legal entities, locations, or business units are included - which processes or services will be assessed - whether technology will be assessed directly or linked to business processes - whether suppliers and other external dependencies will be captured - which areas are outside the current cycle The scope should be broad enough to support useful recovery decisions but specific enough that the team can complete the work consistently. If you cannot assess the entire organization at once, document what is included now and how the remaining areas will be addressed later. ## 3. Choose the BIA Approach Not every organization needs the same BIA process. The method should reflect the size of the organization, the complexity of the processes being assessed, the quality of existing data, available resources, and what leadership needs from the results. The process may use: - structured pre-work followed by facilitated interviews - questionnaires with follow-up discussions - workshops for related business areas - a more detailed assessment for higher-priority processes and a lighter review for lower-priority areas The important point is consistency. Comparable business areas should be assessed using common definitions and enough of the same structure that results can be reviewed together. ## 4. Define the Terms, Time Bands, and Impact Criteria Do not wait until the first interview to decide what important BIA terms mean. Before the cycle begins, define the terminology participants will use. This may include: - business process or service - business impact - recovery time objective - recovery point objective - minimum acceptable service level - internal and external dependency - workaround You should also establish the time bands used to evaluate impact and the impact categories or rating criteria used across the BIA. The exact structure will vary by organization. What matters is that participants are working from the same definitions rather than interpreting terms differently from one interview to the next. ### Do Not Predetermine the Recovery Answer Preparation should establish how recovery requirements will be evaluated, not decide every recovery time before the BIA begins. A proposed RTO should ultimately be supported by the impact of disruption, timing constraints, obligations, dependencies, workarounds, and the minimum business output required. For more on recovery-target logic, see [RTO and RPO in Practice](https://mha-it.com/blog/rto-and-rpo). ## 5. Identify the Right Participants The quality of the BIA depends heavily on who provides the information. Choose participants who understand how the process actually operates. Depending on the area, that may include: - the process or business-unit owner - someone close enough to the daily work to understand operational detail - technology representatives - supplier or procurement contacts - facilities or other support functions - other teams that provide important upstream or downstream inputs The most senior person in the department is not automatically the best source for every question. You need people who can explain what the process produces, what it depends on, how disruption changes the work, and which assumptions need validation. ## 6. Gather What You Already Know Before the Interview Do not spend live interview time collecting information that already exists somewhere else. Before the meeting, review available information such as: - current process or service inventories - organization charts - existing continuity plans - application inventories - supplier or dependency lists - operating schedules - known deadlines and peak periods - previous BIA results - open findings from exercises or previous reviews Do not assume that older information is still correct. Use it to prepare better questions and identify what needs confirmation. ## 7. Prepare the Questionnaire or Pre-Work Good pre-work makes the live discussion more useful. Use it to collect facts participants can reasonably research or verify before the meeting. That may include: - process name and owner - basic process output - operating hours - known systems and data - known suppliers - staffing - important internal dependencies - known workarounds - critical deadlines or peak periods Allow participants to say that an answer is unknown. A known gap is more useful than a guess that later becomes accepted as fact. The pre-work should prepare the interview, not replace it. Use the live conversation for impacts, assumptions, conflicts, recovery needs, and questions that require judgment or cross-functional agreement. For the actual question set, see [The Most Important Questions to Ask in Your Business Impact Analysis](https://mha-it.com/blog/data-gathering-for-the-business-impact-analysis). ## 8. Set Expectations With Participants Participants should know what they are being asked to do before the meeting invitation appears on their calendar. Explain: - why the BIA is being conducted - what is in scope - what information they should prepare - how much time they should expect to spend - what will happen during the interview - how the results will be reviewed - who will see or approve the final information This also gives participants time to involve someone else if they do not have enough operational knowledge to answer a portion of the assessment. ## 9. Build the Interview and Review Schedule A BIA project can become difficult to manage when scheduling starts before the scope and participants are settled. Build a simple project schedule that accounts for: - pre-work distribution - participant deadlines - interviews or workshops - follow-up questions - cross-functional validation - business-owner review - management approval where required Leave room between the interview and final approval. The first conversation may identify a system owner who needs to confirm a dependency, a supplier assumption that procurement needs to review, or a workaround that requires further validation. ## 10. Decide How Results Will Be Validated and Approved Do not wait until the end of the project to decide what “complete” means. Before the BIA starts, define: - who reviews each process record - who confirms business ownership - how disputed answers will be resolved - how unresolved assumptions will be recorded - who approves final recovery requirements - how material gaps will be escalated The participant who provides the data may not be the only person who needs to validate it. A process owner can explain the business need, but IT may need to confirm a technology dependency. Procurement may need to confirm a supplier assumption. Leadership may need to resolve a recovery requirement that current capability cannot meet. For a deeper look at reviewing completed results, see [Business Impact Analysis Validation Guide](https://mha-it.com/blog/business-impact-analysis-validation). ## Are You Ready to Start the BIA? Before scheduling the first interview, confirm that you can answer these questions: - What decision is this BIA supposed to support? - What is in scope? - Which method will we use? - Are the key terms and impact criteria defined? - Who needs to participate? - What should participants complete beforehand? - What questions belong in the live discussion? - How will results be reviewed and validated? - Who resolves conflicting or incomplete information? - What happens to the results after approval? If those answers are clear, the BIA itself becomes much easier to manage. If they are not, spending a little more time on preparation will usually save confusion later in the process. ## Keep Preparation Separate From the Interview Preparation should give the interviewer enough context to spend the live conversation on the questions that actually require discussion. Once the pre-work is complete, the next job is to challenge the answers, understand consequences, resolve assumptions, and determine what still needs validation. For practical guidance on that part of the process, see [BIA Interviews That Produce Useful Data: Questions, Evidence, and Red Flags](https://mha-it.com/blog/bia-interview-questions-useful-data).   ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What should you do before starting a business impact analysis? Before starting a BIA, define the objective, scope, method, terminology, impact criteria, participants, pre-work, project schedule, and validation process. Participants should understand what information they need to prepare and how the results will be reviewed. ### Who should participate in a BIA? Participants should include people who understand how the process actually operates and what it depends on. That commonly includes process owners, knowledgeable staff, and representatives from technology or other support functions when their input is needed. ### What information should be collected before a BIA interview? Pre-work can collect process ownership, basic outputs, operating schedules, staffing, known systems, suppliers, internal dependencies, workarounds, deadlines, and other facts participants can reasonably verify before the meeting. ### Should RTOs be set before the BIA? The organization can define the terminology and allowable response structure beforehand, but the business recovery requirement should be evaluated using the impacts, timing constraints, obligations, dependencies, and operating needs identified through the BIA. ### Should a BIA use a questionnaire or an interview? Both can be useful. Questionnaires are well suited to collecting known facts and pre-work. Interviews are better for discussing impacts, challenging assumptions, resolving inconsistencies, and validating recovery requirements. ### How should BIA results be approved? The approval process depends on the organization, but it should identify who validates the business information, how technical or supplier assumptions are confirmed, who resolves disagreements, and who accepts the final recovery requirements or unresolved gaps. ## Further Reading - [The Most Important Questions to Ask in Your Business Impact Analysis](https://mha-it.com/blog/data-gathering-for-the-business-impact-analysis) - [BIA Interviews That Produce Useful Data: Questions, Evidence, and Red Flags](https://mha-it.com/blog/bia-interview-questions-useful-data) - [Business Impact Analysis Validation Guide](https://mha-it.com/blog/business-impact-analysis-validation) - [Business Impact Analysis: Purpose, Inputs, and Recovery Priorities](https://mha-it.com/blog/functional-business-impact-analysis-bia) - [6 Common Business Impact Analysis Challenges and How to Overcome Them](https://mha-it.com/blog/business-impact-analysis-challenges) [View full post](https://mha-it.com/blog/preparing-for-a-bia) ```json { "@context" : "http://schema.org", "@type" : "BlogPosting", "author" : { "@type" : "Person", "name" : "Richard Long" }, "dateModified" : "2026-10-08T16:54:11.652Z", "datePublished" : "2017-10-10T12:40:25Z", "headline" : "How to Prepare for a Business Impact Analysis", "image" : { "@type" : "ImageObject", "height" : 720, "url" : "https://mha-it.com/hubfs/36.webp", "width" : 1280 }, "mainEntityOfPage" : "https://mha-it.com/blog/preparing-for-a-bia", "publisher" : { "@type" : "Organization", "logo" : { "@type" : "ImageObject", "height" : 60, "url" : "/hs/hsstatic/content_shared_assets/static-1.4092/img/default-amp-logo.png", "width" : 60 }, "name" : "Roadmap to Resiliency" } } ```