Business impact analysis
Also known as BIA
An assessment of which business functions matter most and what it costs when each is unavailable.
The BIA is what turns recovery planning from a technical exercise into a business one. It identifies critical functions, their dependencies, and the cost per hour of losing them.
Its output sets your recovery objectives. Without it, RTO and RPO end up chosen by whoever is loudest rather than by what the interruption actually costs.
Where this comes up
Business impact analysis sits inside our backup and disaster recovery work. If you are trying to work out what this means for your own environment rather than in the abstract, that is the page worth reading next, and a short call will get you a straight answer faster than either.