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Business Continuity: Risk, Succession, Recovery, 390+ Tools
296 students
Business Continuity: Risk, Succession, Recovery, 390+ Tools
Build a business continuity plan with ready tools: risk register, ISO 31000, succession planning, crisis management
Last updated 10/2026
English
English [Auto],
What you'll learn
- Take away 390+ tools in 51 downloadable resources: lecture presentations plus templates, checklists, scripts and calculators
- Get our top working files: continuity handover map, audit checklist, metrics dashboard, improvement roadmap and ROI calculator
- Score your current state in 10 minutes with the express scoring sheet, then audit 13 areas with a weighted checklist
- Build a risk register with probability-impact scores, named owners and mitigation, using ISO 31000 and a heat map
- Name every critical role and its second person with key-role criteria, the impact and risk matrix and the nine-box grid
- Calculate workforce demand against capacity with FTE, gap analysis and forecasting methods before the gap bites
- Run crisis decisions with ready scripts: payroll reduction sequence, dismiss-or-retain score matrix, termination checklist
- Restart operations with a 44-task strategy planning checklist, process mapping procedure, goal system and cash reports
- Learn with Mike, the #1 HR instructor on Udemy: 1,800,000+ enrollments, 170,000 students, about 200 books on Amazon
- Draw on 20 years of hands-on practice at Preply, Wargaming, iDeals and Alfa-Bank
Explore related topics
Course content
16 sections • 43 lectures • 22h 11m total length
Requirements
- No risk management qualification needed: every method in the course comes with a tool you can fill in
- Nothing to buy or install: all files and slide decks are attached to the lectures as XLSX, DOCX and PDF
- A spreadsheet app and a document editor to open the files (Excel or Google Sheets, Word or Google Docs)
- Access to your own headcount and process documentation, however incomplete
- English at intermediate level or above, since all lessons and tools are in English
Description
This course contains the use of artificial intelligence.
399 tools for keeping a business running when a key person, a budget or a plan disappears: 292 ready-to-use files, templates, checklists and scripts, plus 107 models and methods.
Every lesson gives you something to open and fill in the same day, not a theory to remember.
Why continuity plans fail
Most continuity plans are written about the building: the power, the warehouse, the server. Companies rarely lose a building. They lose a person, on an ordinary Tuesday, with two weeks' notice. The process that person ran turns out to be documented nowhere. Nobody can take it over, because no one classified the role as critical. And the team that remains cannot absorb the work, because headcount was set by the budget rather than by the workload. You find all of this out at the worst possible moment, and you start building the plan from a blank page.
What changes after this course
You stop starting from a blank page. You have a scored picture of your current state, a risk register with owners, a named second person for every critical role, a headcount calculation you can defend, a crisis response with the wording already drafted, and a recovery plan for the operation. Each of these is a file or a slide you fill in, not a concept you have to turn into a document yourself.
What is inside: 399 tools, counted file by file
You do not have to take this number on trust. Open any lecture and read its description: every tool inside is listed there by name.
- 51 downloadable resources: the lecture presentations plus 10 standalone working files (express scoring sheet, audit checklist, interview guide, metrics dashboard, audit report template, improvement roadmap and ROI calculator, guiding principles questionnaire, culture-fit hiring guide, illustrated guide to organisational structures, continuity handover map)
- 282 ready-to-use tools inside the presentations:
- 74 templates and sample documents: role risk rating table, succession stakeholder communication plan, risk register and mitigation, HR improvement roadmap
- 64 checklists: emergency action plan elements, good risk culture criteria, succession plan audit, bad-news communication
- 63 question lists and conversation scripts: risk culture audit, key-role identification, position necessity assessment, risk governance diagnostic interview
- 34 matrices and scoring tables: probability-impact risk heatmap, departure risk versus business impact, business impact versus replacement difficulty, succession readiness heatmap
- 31 step-by-step procedures: six-stage incident investigation, interaction mapping and risk assessment, premortem analysis, position reduction and reassignment
- 16 formulas and calculations: succession planning KPIs, FTE calculation, turnover and retention calculations, upcoming-work staffing calculation
- 107 models and methods explained with examples: ISO 31000, Three Lines of Defence, the fraud triangle, the nine-box grid, Delphi forecasting, workforce gap analysis, Lean waste categories, OKR and more
Where the tools are, stage by stage
- Know your current state (28 tools). Maturity scoring, a weighted audit checklist across 13 areas, interview scripts for three audiences, metrics with formulas and benchmarks, a report structure and scripts for handling resistance to the audit.
- Know your risks by name (63 tools). Risk heat map, risk register with probability-impact scores, the 4I human risk model, executive warning signs, a risk culture questionnaire, a decision checklist and sample codes of conduct.
- Give every critical role a second person (33 tools). Key-role selection criteria, role risk rating table, potential criteria, development methods and a succession KPI set.
- Plan capacity (73 tools). FTE and workload calculations, demand forecasting methods, segmentation, optimisation checklists and performance system templates.
- Respond to a crisis (58 tools). Hiring under uncertainty, the least damaging sequence for payroll cuts, a dismiss-or-retain score matrix, termination meeting checklist, communication plans and the contingency plan structure.
- Recover the operation (140 tools). Strategy session checklist, process mapping and improvement procedures, goal system, organisation design diagnostics, project and cash flow reports, infrastructure and procurement interviews.
Who is teaching
I am Mike, the #1 HR instructor on Udemy, with 1,800,000+ course enrollments from 170,000 students, and the author of about 200 books on Amazon. I built the people system at Preply as it became a unicorn and worked at Wargaming, iDeals and Alfa-Bank across 20 years in HR. I hold PHRi, SHRM-CP and HCI sHRBP certifications and represent HRCI in Eastern Europe.
I have experienced how regular drills prepare people to respond to a crisis. At Wargaming, our office occupied 16 floors, and firefighters created smoke in parts of the office before an evacuation alarm. We practised getting out and finding space for everyone, with drills held every six months. After several drills, people were more organised and better prepared to respond to a real crisis. That experience informs the preparedness and response tools in this course.
How the course runs
First you measure where you stand. Then you list your risks and assign owners. Then you find the roles the business cannot lose and build a bench for each. Then you check whether your headcount matches the work. Then you prepare the response for the day things go wrong, and finally you rebuild the operation so it does not depend on any single person. You can also skip straight to the stage you need: every lecture carries its own tools.
What is included
- 42 video lessons, 22 hours
- 51 downloadable resources: lecture presentations and working files
- 399 tools across the lessons, ready to copy into your own documents
- Lifetime access to all materials
- Active instructor support in the Q&A section
- A Udemy Certificate of Completion
Where to start
Name one person whose resignation this month would genuinely hurt, then write down who would do their work on the Monday after. If you cannot finish that sentence, you have found your first risk, and the first tool to open. Every month without a second person for that role is a month the business runs on luck. Enrol now and start your first lesson today.
Who this course is for:
- Operations leaders who own continuity and need working templates instead of a blank page
- Founders whose company would stall if two particular people resigned
- HR and people leaders asked to prepare for a downturn without cutting capability
- Risk and compliance specialists who need a risk register, heat map and control checklists ready to adapt
- General managers taking over an operation with undocumented processes
- Consultants who want a ready audit checklist, interview guides and report template for client work
- Anyone whose continuity plan covers the building and not the people