X · Substitutability
Is there another way to do the work?
Can the process continue if its digital service stops, through a replacement or a degraded operating mode?
An assessment method · Polycrisis Observatory
Could your organization continue if a digital service stopped?
IRON proposes examining each business-process and digital-service pair through three lenses: substitution options, service resilience, and the business consequences of an outage.
The model
Three questions that make dependency visible
For each business-process and digital-service pair, the framework asks three questions. Criticality helps assess the consequences; substitutability and resilience shed light on ways to keep work going.
Y · Digital resilience
Can the service withstand disruption?
Redundancy, diversification, safeguards, and recovery capacity contribute to the service’s resilience assessment.
Z · Business criticality
What would stopping the process put at risk?
Operational, regulatory, and reputational impacts help estimate the consequences for organizational continuity.
The model proposes a summary weighted by criticality. Its validation and calibration are underway with field partners.
Why this project
Organizational robustness matters too
Security and continuity frameworks provide their own reference points. IRON proposes a complementary lens: can the activity continue if its digital service fails?
This question matters when disruptions overlap and spread along interconnected digital chains. IRON focuses on consequences for an organization’s processes; it does not claim to measure polycrisis as a whole.
The method
From inventory to possible actions
- 1
Map
Identify processes, the digital services they depend on, and their criticality.
- 2
Assess
Rate process substitutability and the resilience of the services involved.
- 3
Prioritize action
Identify priorities to discuss with teams and check in the field.
What the framework aims to surface
A map to guide further analysis
The model aims to make dependencies visible for closer examination. These working signals are being checked against teams’ expertise and refined through ongoing field validation.
Map
Processes, services, and dependencies.
Priorities
Remediation options to examine.
Proposed summary
An exploratory indicator, still to be calibrated.
Maturity
Field validation underway with partners
The preprint presents the model and compares it retrospectively with two documented incidents that had contrasting outcomes. Partners are currently taking part in field validation and calibration of the framework.
Explore further
Guide, paper, and context
Acknowledgements
Thanks to the teams contributing to IRON testing
Thank you to La Mêlée, AD’OCC, and InfoGreen Factory for taking part in IRON’s field tests, past and ongoing.
