The Board-Level Economics of Downtime
TechTarget, Tuesday, July 7th, 2026
Downtime is now a board-level strategic issue, not just an IT cost.
The article argues that downtime has evolved from an IT-only concern into a strategic business issue requiring board-level attention.
Traditional cost calculations focused solely on lost revenue significantly underestimate the total impact, which also spans employee productivity losses, data access disruption, compliance risk, and supply chain complications.
Rather than relying on conventional uptime percentages, executives should use business-focused metrics like Recovery Time Objective (RTO) and Recovery Point Objective (RPO) to guide resilience investments.
Organizations that apply comprehensive financial modeling can make better capital allocation decisions and turn resilience into a competitive differentiator that protects stakeholder confidence.