Specialist: Business Continuity

The Road Accident Fund’s mission is to provide appropriate cover to all road users within the borders of South Africa; to rehabilitate and compensate persons injured as a result of motor vehicle accidents in a timely and caring manner; and to actively promote safe use of our roads.

Purpose of the Job: Reporting to the Senior Manager: Risk Advisory and Business Continuity, the successful incumbent is responsible responsible to provide specialised business continuity expertise in the RAF through implementation of appropriate strategies, testing of BCM plans and effective management of crisis.

Key Performance Areas

Policy Review and Implementation

• Contribute to the development and implementation of departmental policy, procedures and processes.
• Keep up to date with effective policy and practice execution strategies.
• Assist with the development of BCM Policy, framework, procedures and guidelines.  

BCM planning and governance

• Assess risks interrupting service delivery and availability and draw up the Fund business continuity plans (Pandemic, Water Crisis, Power outages) to mitigate the impact.
• Facilitate the business impact analysis workshops annually or when there is strategic change to the business, for all business processes.
• Support senior management in aligning all BC planning, initiatives and goals with organizational goals and Infrastructure capabilities.
• Contribute to the development, maintainance, or implementation of business continuity strategies and solutions.
• Facilitate and coordinate the development of the business continuity management (BCM) plans in consultation with the business and other key stakeholders, and documentation of business continuity procedures. Prepare a ICT disaster recovery plan (DRP) in consultation with business and other key stakeholders.
• Safeguard data processing operations by identifying potential problem areas and single points of failure that may result in interruptions to critical data processing operations.
• Co-ordinate the tactical response to managing crisis as per the Crisis Management Plan.
• Facilitate the draffting of the  crisis management plan (CMP) in consultation with business and other key stakeholders.
• Maintain Business Continuity best practice standards within the fund and regularly update templates on policies, standards, and systems from trend analyses.
•  Revisit BCM documents annually and update accordingly to maintain best practice.
• Prepare and and submit the BCM policy, BCPs and Recovery Strategies for review by the Senior Manager.
• Update policy and annual BCM strategy .
• Collaborate with the Project Management Office and Change Management functions on BCM related projects.
• Plan, conduct, and debrief regular BC related exercises to test the adequacy of existing plans and strategies, updating procedures and plans regularly.
• Documenting the results of all tests and exercises, and identifying and implementing any recommended enhancements to the Business Continuity plans and procedures.
• Support all departments and business units in the company to exercise, update and maintain their specific BC plans and procedures including revision of specific BIA and risk assessment. 

Compliance, monitoring and evaluation

• Compliance of BCM to principles of King IV, BCM international standards and other best practices.
• Analyse service level agreement, perform third party risk analysis and develop appropriate strategies to manage business continuity of critical suppliers / vendors.
• Audit supplier / vendor contracts to identify gaps, and recommend amendment of existing service level agreements to comply with the contractual standards.
• Raise the profile of Business Continuity across the organisation and ensure that information is available to staff (with the aim of embedding BCM into the activities of the organisation).
• Monitor the implementation of the RAF BCM Plans.
• Drive awareness of Business Continuity (BC) policies, strategies, and frameworks throughout the Fund through physical engagements, training, and consultation sessions.
• Report on the performance of the BCM section.

Dry run BCM implementation

• Aid Coordinate/assist in the development of departmental recovery processes and procedures in support of the organisation’s Business Continuity Plan.
• Conduct scheduled dry runs IRO BCM implementation with business and teams.
• Prepare scenarios for testing and document these scenarios for testing.
• Update scenarios / test schedules / reports based on dry runs.
• Report any major deviations to Senior Manager.
• Where necessary, update relevant policies/ strategies/ documents/ templates.
• Ensure that the organisation’s plans/arrangements are regularly reviewed and tested.
• Act as a coordinator for continuity efforts after a disruption event by coordinating with the emergency and crisis management teams as required. 
• Continuously liaise with the ICT Disaster Recovery Team to ensure business and ICT recovery is aligned.

Risk Management

• Report to Senior Manager Risk on any pertinent risks.
• Conduct quarterly risk assessment IRO BCM.
• Prepare and maintain a BCM risk register together with mitigation strategies.
• Monitor BCM risks and communicate to relevant risk owners.

Reporting

• Prepare and submit  reports as and when required to provide progress updates and/or inform management decisions.
• Develop reports/ policies/ procedures and guide the process through the alignment of the documents to the overall RAF’s Strategy.
• Develop functional reporting systems, for management, projects or performance reporting.
• Prepare proposals, briefings, presentations, reports, and other documentation and provide management information both verbally and in report format.

Stakeholder Management

• Facilitate and manage communication with relevant internal and external stakeholders.
• Build trusting working relationships with stakeholders.
• Manage relationships with vendors, service providers or procurement teams and ensure that all relevant procured items are invoiced and paid on time.
• Communicate with all levels of stakeholder contact.
• Represent the Fund in relevant external activities and events.

Qualifications and Experience

• Bachelor's Degree/ Advanced Diploma in Social Sciences / Risk Management/ Business Continuity / Business Information Systems related qualification.
• Certification in e.g. ISO 22301 Lead Implementer, CBCI, AMBCI, MBCI, MBCP will be an added advantage.
• Relevant 5-7 years’ experience in Business Continuity related environment.

Technical and Behavioral Competencies Required

• Resilience.
• Communication
• Working with People
• Network and Alliances
• Planning, Organising and Coordinating
• Employee Engagement
• Personal Mastery
• Judgement and Decision Making
• Client Service Orientation
• Understanding of corporate governance standards and practice.
• Advance report writing skills with attention to high quality standards.
• Understanding Risk assessment processes.
• Understanding of IT and Ethics management frameworks and applicable laws.
• Strong stakeholder relations management.
• Understanding of King IV Report and BCM standards.

NB: “RAF offers Total Employment Cost packages with no additional contributions from the Employer, successful candidates are required to structure their packages in a manner that will suit their needs”.

The Road Accident Fund subscribes to the principles of employment equity and preference will be given to People with Disabilities.

Applicants who have not received any correspondence from us within six weeks from the closing date can consider themselves unsuccessful

Security Vetting shall be conducted on all prospective employees

It is the applicants’ responsibility to have foreign qualification evaluated by the South African Qualification Authority (SAQA) and to provide proof of such evaluation.