Webinar Replay: COVID-19 and Organizational Resilience
Recorded 31 March 2020 (09:00 - 10:30 BST)
The Covid-19 global crisis is an extraordinary situation that is creating unprecedented challenges for us all. The scale of the complexity, range of impacts and the profound nature of the potential consequences of this crisis cannot be overstated.
This presentation is the first in a series of briefings that is designed to assist organizations to respond effectively to the current situation, survive, then emerge from the crisis and be in a position to rebuild and prosper as swiftly as possible.
This presentation will provide an overview of the strategic approach that will be required to meet these objectives.
Rob Macfarlane will discuss the value of using an organizational resilience approach to the current situation and will provide an overview of how the wide range of relevant skill sets and capabilities, that are available to an organization, such as risk management, crisis management, business continuity management and emergency management, can be brought together and used to respond to the crisis in a joined up, efficient and coherent manner to provide the most effective response.
Kev Brear will discuss the use of crisis management principles and good practice to assist the leaders of organizations to build an understanding of the situation and its challenges, define appropriate objectives and strategies, employ effective command, control and communication solutions, respond to the impacts appropriately and building resilience capabilities into the crisis management team itself, so that it is able to face the challenge of the response activities over a protracted period of time.
At the end of the session, Rob and Kev also answer the questions posed by live webinar attendees.
Meet our speakers:
Robert MacFarlane, Deputy Director, Head, Resilience Training, Doctrine & Standards, Cabinet Office
Dr Robert MacFarlane is Deputy Director in the Cabinet Office Civil Contingencies Secretariat. He has oversight of the operation of the UK Emergency Planning College, the central government crisis training programme and the development of doctrine, standards and assurance for local resilience capabilities.
Rob was one of the principal authors of the UK Joint Emergency Services Doctrine and led the development of British Standards on Crisis Management and Organizational Resilience. In addition to his domestic role in UK resilience, which has included EU Exit and COVID19 operational roles, Rob has worked internationally for over 20 years in post-conflict reconstruction, risk, crisis and disaster management.
Kevin Brear, Director of Consulting- Technology Risk Management, Xcina Consulting Limited
Kevin is a consulting director with Xcina Consulting and the firm's client service lead for crisis management and business continuity matters. He’s previously held roles as a practice leader for crisis management and cyber resilience with a global consulting firm and a UK consulting firm. He’s also held roles with a tier 1 Global Bank as a third-party risk lead and as an information risk manager.
Prior to these roles, Kevin was a police officer in the City of London Police, and he led the force contingency planning and Gold support teams. He assisted in developing national and international standards for crisis management, business continuity and resilience with the British Standards Institution (BSI) and is currently the convenor of the ISO and European joint standard's working group, which is developing the new standards on crisis management (ISO 22361 and ISO 22360).
Deborah Higgins, Head of Cabinet Office Emergency Planning College (EPC)
Deborah is an experienced emergency management and business continuity specialist. Having designed large-scale crisis management training and exercises, she has also led on the design and development of British Standards and qualifications.
As Head of the Cabinet Office Emergency Planning College, Deborah is responsible for directing all EPC activities and for managing the relationship with the Cabinet Office, Serco and wider stakeholder groups. With vast practical experience in emergency management and business continuity management internationally, Deborah has designed and coordinated large-scale multi-agency incident and crisis management training and exercises at operational, tactical and strategic level.
Please note: The British Standards Institution (BSI) is the National Standards Body (NSB) for the UK. This webinar was organized as a collaboration between BSI (The National Standards Body), BSI Group and the Emergency Planning College (Cabinet Office), in accordance with competition law. By registering for this webinar replay, you are providing consent for BSI’s NSB and non-NSB businesses alongside the Cabinet Office and Emergency Planning College to contact you on matters relating to this webinar.