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Business Continuity Planners

Typical education: Bachelor's degreeLower pressure Bright Outlook

What they do

Develop, maintain, or implement business continuity and disaster recovery strategies and solutions, including risk assessments, business impact analyses, strategy selection, and documentation of business continuity and disaster recovery procedures. Plan, conduct, and debrief regular mock-disaster exercises to test the adequacy of existing plans and strategies, updating procedures and plans regularly. Act as a coordinator for continuity efforts after a disruption event.

Kinds of work

  • Enterprising: Leading, persuading, selling and starting new projects or businesses.
  • Conventional: Organizing information, following clear procedures and working with data and details.
  • Investigative: Science, research, figuring out how things work and solving complex problems.

Lower pressure: How much pressure workers in this job report: deadlines, conflict, dealing with upset people, the cost of mistakes, responsibility for others' safety, competition and long hours. It varies a lot from one employer to the next. Source: U.S. Department of Labor worker surveys.

Pay, tasks and more

Salary

United States $83,050 Median per year · $39.93/hr Most earn $47,880–$150,010

BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, 2025.

What you might do

  • Recommend or implement methods to monitor, evaluate, or enable resolution of safety, operations, or compliance interruptions.
  • Create or administer training and awareness presentations or materials.
  • Write reports to summarize testing activities, including descriptions of goals, planning, scheduling, execution, results, analysis, conclusions, and recommendations.
  • Establish, maintain, or test call trees to ensure appropriate communication during disaster.
  • Design or implement products and services to mitigate risk or facilitate use of technology-based tools and methods.
  • Conduct or oversee collection of corporate intelligence to avoid fraud, financial crime, cyber attack, terrorism, and infrastructure failure.

Job outlook

Bright Outlook Numerous Job Openings

United States
4% more jobs by 2035, about as fast as average · about 98,700 openings a year

Openings include new jobs and jobs left by workers who retire or change careers. Projections: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. "Bright Outlook": U.S. Department of Labor.

Where they work

  • Federal government, excluding postal service18.1%
  • State government, excluding education and hospitals5.3%
  • Management of companies and enterprises5.1%
  • Colleges, universities, and professional schools4.7%
  • Management, scientific, and technical consulting services4.5%

Share of all workers in this career. Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, National Employment Matrix.

Experience before this job: 2 to 4 years

Career path

How people usually get into this career, from school to their first job and beyond.

Typical education: Bachelor's degreeExperience before this job: 2 to 4 years

Business Continuity Planning usually isn't a straight-out-of-school job. Most people first work 2 to 4 years in a related role, often after a bachelor's degree, before they take on continuity planning. That usually means about 6 to 8 years from starting college to this career.

  1. Bachelor's degree in business, information systems, emergency management, or a related field

    4 years

    A bachelor's degree gives you the planning, analysis, and writing skills that employers expect, and it is the typical education for this career.

  2. Project Management Specialist

    2-4 years

    Working on projects teaches you to plan, track risks, coordinate many people, and write clear procedures, which are the core skills of continuity planning.

  3. Business Continuity Planner

    Career goal

    You develop and test continuity and disaster recovery plans, run mock-disaster exercises, and coordinate the response when a disruption happens.

Where it can lead

  1. Emergency Management Director

    4-6 years of experience first

    You lead broader emergency preparedness and response for an organization or community, which means more leadership and public coordination than planning alone.

  2. Security Manager

    4-6 years of experience first

    You oversee the security of people, facilities, and information, often managing teams and budgets and setting security policy across the organization.

What you can do now

Ideas for high school and college students.

In high school

  • Take computer science, statistics, and writing classesThese build the analysis, technology, and documentation skills you will use when writing and testing plans.
  • Join a club like DECA, FBLA, or a debate or model UN teamThese clubs teach planning, teamwork, and presenting under pressure, which are all part of running a disaster exercise.
  • Get a starter job that involves responsibilityA part-time job at a store, restaurant, or front desk teaches you to stay calm and follow procedures during busy or unexpected moments.
  • Volunteer with a local emergency or community groupVolunteering with a Red Cross chapter, a community emergency response team, or a local food bank shows you how organizations respond to disruptions.
  • Ask a school or town emergency manager for a short conversationHearing how they plan for emergencies helps you decide whether this field interests you and gives you a contact for later.

In college

  • Major in business, information systems, or emergency managementThese majors give you the planning, risk, and technology background that employers look for in continuity roles.
  • Take a project management or risk management courseThese courses teach the planning and risk assessment methods that continuity work depends on.
  • Get an internship in IT, operations, or riskAn internship lets you see real recovery and planning work and gives you experience for your first job.
  • Work a campus job that involves coordinationJobs like a residence hall assistant, lab coordinator, or event staff help you practice handling disruptions and communicating during problems.
  • Explore a professional certification in the fieldMany people in continuity work pursue professional certifications once they have some work experience, so learning what they require early helps you plan ahead.

Tips for getting started

  • Look for entry roles in IT, operations, or project coordination where you can help with backup, recovery, or incident response work. Those experiences translate directly into continuity planning.
  • Learn how a business impact analysis and a risk assessment are done. Reading public examples of continuity plans, or asking a local business how it prepares for outages, will help you understand the work.
  • Practice writing clear step-by-step procedures. Continuity plans are only useful if people can follow them under stress, so clear writing is a major skill.

Related jobs a step up

Education, experience and related careers: U.S. Department of Labor. The step-by-step path, where it can lead and what you can do now were written by AI as typical examples; many people take other ways.

College majors that lead here

Majors: U.S. Department of Education and BLS (CIP–SOC crosswalk). Earnings and debt: College Scorecard, typical across U.S. colleges.

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