Valley Credit Union

“Ongoing Operations has always been really great to work with… I think it’s a good relationship.” - Cindy Roesler, Chief Risk Officer, Valley CU

OVERVIEW

Before working with OGO, Valley Credit Union didn’t have a cohesive business continuity plan (BCP) strategy. The owners of their BCP were their crisis response team, which included department managers and C-level staff. Their BCP was written on a master sheet and distributed to key personnel across several USB flash drives. The team was struggling to keep all their plans updated and ready for an incident or event. Working with OGO provided Valley CU better infrastructure and planning for emergencies and other interruptions to business.

Valley CU wanted to get more of their team involved to ensure a proactive approach to business continuity planning, rather than a reactive one. Without frequent engagement with their plans, they felt that silos were forming between plan owners in different departments. They felt their lack of big-picture familiarity with the greater business continuity plan could create issues.

Business continuity plans must be living and capable of responding to any number of potential threats. However, that’s a difficult feat to manage without a comprehensive BCP strategy. They had to update USB drives spread among staff in their various branches throughout Montana and Wyoming, which created version control issues.

SOLUTION

Valley CU turned to OGO to shore up their BCP strategy. OGO assists with two major factors in planning: infrastructure and consulting. For infrastructure, Valley CU uses OGO’s web-based CU Recover tool, which provides an easier, centralized location for critical plans and information, such as:

• Business impact analysis (BIA)
• Business continuity plans
• Event tracking
• Vendor and staff contact information
• Crisis Management Notification System (CMNS)
• Reports

CU Recover helps Valley CU quickly review and update their plans without tracking down USB sticks. Plus, Valley CU no longer relies on as much tedious manual work—the notification system replaced their phone tree, and CU Recover automatically generated reports. Moving over to a web-based tool has also increased Valley CU’s flexibility and agility in emergency scenarios. Fewer team members need to be on premise—they can now accomplish much more from home. That simplifies many logistical aspects of recovery, which reduces both recovery time and stress.

“CU Recover is a good landing area for anything we would need in the event of a disaster or incident.” – Cindy Roesler, CRO, Valley CU

With consulting, OGO facilitated greater BCP engagement throughout the credit union. Their annual site visits helped with BCP updates, training, and tabletop exercises. More essential employees are now included in preparations and planning, increasing engagement and removing silos.

RESULTS

Since working with OGO, Valley CU feels far more prepared for incidents. Their review and updating procedures are improved with CU Recover. “Instead of updating half a dozen USB drives, we now have a central repository for BCP and DR plans,” says Cindy Roesler, Chief Risk Officer at Valley CU. CU Recover provides resources for “any procedures, documents, anything we would need.”

Valley CU also feels much more comfortable about their business continuity plans and strategies now. Through consulting and exercises, their expanded team has a much better grasp on what to do, and when. Valley CU’s updated step-by-step procedures are easy to follow, giving them a clear path back to business as usual, no matter what.