Preparing for the Unexpected
ALEX FULLICK, MBCI,CBCP,CBRA,ITIL,CORS,cABCF,ISO22301,Author
Preparing for the Unexpected is about how people, organizations and communities plan, prepare, test, communicate and respond to sudden unplanned events such as natural and manmade disasters and crises. The show is for everyone who wants an understanding of how plans are created for individuals, organizations and communities and for anyone who wants to know what they can do in their own lives to help protect themselves from unexpected events.
There is a myth that disasters happen to others but in reality, they happen to everyone. It's just a matter of when and how well-prepared you are. The greater the level of awareness, communication and knowledge, the quicker one bounces back from adversity.
The overall aim of Preparing for the Unexpected is to reduce the suffering, effects and impacts caused as a result of disasters and unexpected life events by increasing knowledge and awareness of Operational Resilience, Business Contingency, Disaster Planning, Crisis Management, and related activities.
There is a myth that disasters happen to others but in reality, they happen to everyone. It's just a matter of when and how well-prepared you are. The greater the level of awareness, communication and knowledge, the quicker one bounces back from adversity.
The overall aim of Preparing for the Unexpected is to reduce the suffering, effects and impacts caused as a result of disasters and unexpected life events by increasing knowledge and awareness of Operational Resilience, Business Contingency, Disaster Planning, Crisis Management, and related activities.
Episodes
Mentioned books
Jan 16, 2020 • 53min
Thinking Beyond Business Continuity: Crisis Leadership Strategies
In today's world, crisis management must do more than help respond to a crisis effectively. Taking an integrated approach by connecting the dots between risk management, crisis management, communications and business continuity will help and organization build a robust contingency framework. We speak with CS&A International Managing Principal Caroline Sapriel who is a global expert on how to manage communications during a crisis. Caroline will help us understand how and why we must integrate Business Contingency Planning and Crisis Management and Communications so that they align within an organization and ensure we are creating a culture of resiliency within our organization.
Dec 19, 2019 • 56min
Conversation with BCM/Resiliency Expert Ann Pickren
This week we talk with BCM industry expert, pioneer and industry leader, Ann Pickren. Ann will talk to us about her time in the BCM/Resilience industry. Along the way she provides some great stories and advice for BCM/Resilience professionals of all levels. We'll touch on such things as Risk Management, Cyber Threats and Security, Lesson Learned, obtaining an Advisory seat at the Executive Table and bringing various teams together to create common goals. We'll even touch on Artificial Intelligence. My chat is Ann is definitely a show you don't want to miss.
Dec 12, 2019 • 54min
Catastrophic Response Actions or Extreme BCP
Catastrophic events are very unusual but also very disruptive. The Canadian Province of British Columbia (BC) has a high certainty that a major event will affect its ability to continue delivery government services to its citizens. This week we’ll talk to the Executive Director of the Ministry of Citizens' Services for the BC Government, Ivan Rincon. Ivan will talk to us about the vision developed by the BC government to address the catastrophic events that face the Province. He’ll walk us through how the government started planning for the event(s) and what actions are currently underway to address the on-coming threat in a large and complex organization, to ensure continuity of government services.
Dec 5, 2019 • 54min
Adaptive Business Continuity - Part 3
We continue our talk with Prof. David Lindstedt, who along with co-author Mark Armour, created the Adaptive Business Continuity movement, which is taking the BCM/DR industry by storm - and getting people talking. We'll learn the latest happenings in the Adaptive BC movement and even discover about the new Adaptive BC certification. David will also talk to us about how and where Adaptive BC fits in with Organizational Resiliency and how it can help change our way of doing our traditional training and awareness measures. As always, talking about the Adaptive BC movement will get you thinking on how you can improve your own BCM/DR programs.
Nov 14, 2019 • 56min
Integrating Cyber Threats into BCM
Today’s most threatening scenario is a cyber-attack. It comes without prior warning, can lay dormant for weeks, may defy detection for months and may have the greatest impact upon organizations. As in most new threats, the response has been a focused resource oriented approach. But entities now see that a non-integrated approach just dilates the effectiveness of the response. In order to be most effective a holistic BCM approach to detection and response has proven to be most effective. We speak with renowned expert and author, Allan Berman, President of the DRI Foundation, who will help us understand what cyber threats are out there and how we can help mitigate the probability of an attack harming us and our organizations. You’ll never look at your refrigerator the same way again!
Nov 7, 2019 • 54min
The Power of Resilience
Resilience is something all communities, organizations and individuals strive for. We speak with international resiliency expert, researcher and author Professor Yossi Sheffi about his book 'The Power of Resilience: How the Best Companies Manage the Unexpected'. We'll talk about what resilience really means and what it isn't and understanding how redundancy and flexibility come into play. Prof Sheffi will also talk to us on how we can sometime loose our way during planning and cause problems for ourselves, suffer from 'Paralysis by Analysis'. He will show us how we need to use a two-pronged approach when creating organizational; people strategies and Business strategies. It's a very informative show full of great examples and insights.
Oct 31, 2019 • 56min
Mastering Business Continuity Management
Mastering Business Continuity Management (BCM) can be a very tough goal since professionals are not just dealing with a couple of departments within an organization, they are working with the entire organization, including its 34rd party external partners and their local communities. We talk to globallay recognized Business Continuity expert, speaker, trainer, consultant and author, Dr. Michael D Redmond as we talk about some of the key foundational components of a good BCM program that all BCM professionals must know and understand. will touch on Project Management, Risk Assessments and Risk Analyses (and the difference between them) and the Business Impact Analysis.
Oct 24, 2019 • 54min
The Role of Social Media in Organizational Resilience
Social Media has the power to influence are personal and professional lives and not always in a manner in which we expect. It can be full of misinformation that can cause allot of harm and recognizing the good from the bad can be extremely difficult for organizations. This week, we welcome back Lt. Glen Mills from the Burlington, Massachusetts Police Department who is a specialist in monitoring social media; separating the good information from the bad. He will provide us some key insights that our organizations –and even ourselves – should follow to ensure we don’t get stuck in the quagmire and confusion social media can sometimes cause. Glen will provide us with examples and tips to help organizations, communities and individuals better prepare for - and respond to - situations that can cause us harm and prevent us from being taken in by those who would do us harm. When we better understand how to monitor and leverage social media, the more resilient we can become.
Oct 17, 2019 • 53min
Resilient Organizations in the Face of Climate Change
As the effects of climate change are increasing in frequency and severe weather events become more pronounced and visible, there is greater need for communities and organizations to tackle the issue head-on. They need explore strategies for mitigating the related risks and for strengthening adaptive capacity to handle escalating impacts. We speak with Gillian Coyles, who is a Senior Planner of Enterprise Crisis & Business Continuity Management at the Canadian Tire Corporation. She will help us understand some of the challenges faced by Canadian Tire and learn what her organization is doing to adapt their business continuity practices to climate change to improve their overall resilience.
Oct 10, 2019 • 54min
Fall DRJ 2019 (Phoenix) - Conference Summary
Another great DRJ conference in Phoenix, Arizona this year (Sep 29 - Oct 2/19). This show highlights some of the sessions, workshops and talks and my own experiences from the conference. Be sure to check out the live events broadcast page to hear the chats we had with conference vendors and speakers.
