A tabletop exercise is a facilitated, discussion-based walkthrough of a security incident scenario. Participants talk through each step of the response plan — who gets notified, what decisions need to be made, and where hand-offs happen — all without touching production systems. The goal is to uncover gaps in your incident response procedures before a real event forces you to discover them under pressure. Tabletop exercises are low-cost, repeatable, and recommended by ISO 27001 as part of business continuity preparedness.