Understanding business continuity in the context of SME resilience
Resilience is defined as the "ability of a system, community or society exposed to hazards to resist, absorb, accommodate, adapt to, transform and recover from the effects of a hazard in a timely and efficient manner, including through the preservation and restoration of its essential basic structures and functions through risk management".
UNDRR's ongoing project with small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) focuses on strengthening disaster resilience by building their capacity to make risk-informed decisions, plan for disruptions and invest in practical resilience measures. Business continuity planning-a central component of the project-operationalizes these capabilities by translating them into clear and actionable practices.
Disaster resilience of SMEs
From a business perspective, disaster resilience can be understood as an organization's ability to anticipate, absorb, adapt to and recover from shocks. While resilience extends beyond the scope of a business continuity plan (BCP), a tested and up-to-date BCP helps embed resilience into everyday business operations. Here is how business continuity supports the disaster resilience of SMEs:
Anticipate: A business continuity plan should be based on a solid understanding of the risk landscape. Hence developing a BCP requires SMEs to assess their exposure to hazards and identify critical functions, assets, and dependencies. The process increases risk awareness and improves an SME's ability to anticipate disruptions, while helping them better understand how hazards may affect people, assets, operations and supply chains.
Absorb: SMEs are often disproportionately affected by disasters due to their limited resources, reliance on a small number of suppliers or customers and informal management structures. Business continuity planning helps reduce these vulnerabilities by embedding risk awareness into everyday decision-making and operational planning. By identifying critical processes, setting priorities, and preparing practical response measures, SMEs are better able to withstand disruptions and limit operational downtime - one of the main reasons small businesses fail after disruptions.
Adapt: Resilient SMEs are not only able to withstand disruptions but also adjust to changing conditions in their operating environment. Business continuity planning supports adaptation by encouraging SMEs to explore alternative ways of operating, such as flexible staffing arrangements, diversified suppliers, backup systems, and clear communication strategies. This forward-thinking approach helps SMEs remain operational under stress and adjust more effectively as circumstances evolve.
Recover: The ability to restore operations - quickly and at all - is a core component of disaster resilience. SMEs with business continuity plans are better positioned to resume activities, maintain customer trust, protect livelihoods, and stabilize cash flow following a disruption. Faster recovery not only improves business survival rates but also contributes to the overall resilience of local economies and communities.
Essentially the process of developing, maintaining, testing and updating a BCP equips SMEs with the knowledge to prepare for disruptions, respond effectively under pressure, adapt to changing conditions, and recover more quickly. In this way, business continuity planning makes resilience practical and actionable.
Assessing resilience maturity
To further support businesses in strengthening resilience, UNDRR has developed the Resilience Maturity Assessment (ReMA) tool. ReMA provides a structured framework for assessing organizational strengths, identifying gaps in resilience practices, while also recommending areas for improvement. It goes beyond business continuity planning and evaluates resilience across six core pillars: policy and governance, leadership and culture, organization, capacity, operating model, and value chain. Together, these pillars capture the key dimensions of enterprise resilience and enable organizations, including SMEs, to benchmark their maturity over time.
Background on the SME resilience project
The "strengthening the disaster resilience of SMEs" project brings together city authorities, chambers of commerce, other private sector actors and SMEs to assess current resilience capacities, share good practices and guide SMEs toward adopting practical risk-reducing measures. In 2025, the project engaged over 100 SMEs in starting to take concrete steps on their resilience journeys. Together with partners in Barcelona, Bridgetown and Sendai, UNDRR organized dialogues and training workshops, co-developed resilience tools tailored to local needs and supported SMEs in drafting and testing business continuity plans. UNDRR also conducted landscape assessments, providing local partners with actionable recommendations to strengthen governance and coordination, financing, capacity-building, and other services to help SMEs prepare for new and existing risks in 2026 and beyond.