The World Cup is on and during the weekend, as I was watching a couple of games (and yes, also enjoying some appetizers) , I was reminded that the teams lifting the trophy aren’t always the most talented. They’re the best prepared.
Let’s think about it for a minute. Long before the opening match, the winning teams studied their opponents, refined their tactics, tested different formations, identified how to block a key player on the opposing team (Ronaldo or Messi come to mind) and prepared for situations they hope never happen as they know unexpected challenges are all part of the game.
Watching these games made me realize that IT leaders, just as soccer teams and Coaches, face a remarkably similar challenge. The only difference is that our “final match” can happen on any Tuesday morning or even during the weekend. Remember hackers and bad elements don’t work on 90 minutes time frames and they “work” 24/7.
A ransomware attack, a failed software update, an accidental deletion (ouch), a cloud outage and the list go on. Unlike soccer, there is no fixture list telling us when disruption will arrive. When it does, it’s too late to discover that your backups haven’t been tested or that your cloud workloads, endpoints, or SaaS applications aren’t fully protected.
Over the years, and as mentioned before, I’ve spoken with countless IT professionals, and one thing has always stood out: almost everyone believes they’re prepared. Yet industry research continues to show a different reality. Organizations remain highly confident in their backup strategies while many still experience data loss, lengthy recovery times, and unexpected gaps when a real incident occurs. It’s a little like watching a coach of a national soccer team arrive at the World Cup (place the name of your favorite team here) convinced they can win without playing a single warm-up match and without doing prep work and practicing several different tactics on the field.
One of the biggest misconceptions I continue to see is that organizations still think of data backup and recovery as the finish line. “We have backups.” Problem solved. No, it is not!
But today’s IT environments are far more complex than they were just a few years ago. Modern data backup and cybersecurity resilience require much more than protecting on-premises servers. Organizations must secure hybrid infrastructures, cloud-native workloads, endpoints, Microsoft 365, SaaS applications, and, just as importantly, ensure that recovery can happen quickly and with confidence. This is where I believe cyber resilience changes the conversation.
It’s no longer enough to simply create copies of data. Organizations need immutable backup capabilities that prevent recovery points from being altered by ransomware, automated recovery orchestration that minimizes downtime, endpoint protection that extends beyond the data center, and continuous validation that recovery will actually work when it’s needed most.
That’s why I don’t see backup as a standalone product anymore. I see it as part of a complete cyber resilience strategy. Solutions such as OpenText™ Data Protector, Data Protector for Cloud Workloads, Unified Endpoint Management, and others, solve a different piece of the puzzle. Together, they help organizations protect data wherever it lives, strengthen cybersecurity resilience, and recover quickly without compromising business continuity.
What I admire most about World Cup champions isn’t their ability to score goals. It’s how calm Coaches and players remain when everything is on the line (next time you watch a match, pay attention to their expressions and body language). They trust their preparation because they’ve invested years getting ready for those moments and I believe IT leaders deserve and need the same confidence.
Imagine facing a ransomware attack knowing your recovery points are protected by immutable backup, your recovery process has been tested, and your critical systems can be restored quickly with minimal disruption. That peace of mind doesn’t come from simply running a backup every night. It comes from investing in a complete cyber resilience strategy that combines data protection, recovery, endpoint security, and business continuity into a single, coordinated approach.
Remember: The team that will win the World Cup will not become champions because they prepare after the opening whistle.
The same lesson applies to every organization. So, train, prepare, evaluate tactics and be ready for the unexpected.
Note: If you are wondering, I am cheering for both Canada and Germany.
