Workshop Descriptions

WORKSHOP SESSIONS
Monday, February 25, 2008
13:30-15:00

Workshop 1: Crisis Management Workshop
Jack Smith, LaSalle Bank, USA

Synopsis:  In this workshop you will learn:

  • How to differentiate between a significant problem and a true crisis
  • Effective methods of practicing for an event
  • How to effectively facilitate a crisis meeting regardless of number of attendees
  • Working with public officials during an event
  • Setting priorities and structuring successful crisis management meetings
  • Management of the crisis and key communication tips
  • Managing the media and your vendors during the event

This session will help you build and implement a comprehensive Crisis Management program.  Mr. Smith will share proven techniques that will improve communication during a company crisis, regardless of the origin.

Mr. Smith has acted as the primary facilitator for his company for such events as 9/11; a 72 hour Anthrax Scare; the Northeast power outage; and a fire at the LaSalle Bank Headquarters which was the largest skyscraper fire in the history of the city of Chicago.  You will learn how in these and in other cases, crisis management and business continuity efforts merged with great success.

Workshop 2: Planning a Tabletop Exercise for Businesses
Laurie Pearce, Pearces2 Consulting and Don Bindon, RCMP (ret.), Canada

Participants will have the opportunity to engage in an active participatory workshop on all aspects of designing and hosting a tabletop exercise.  The two presenters have years of experience in conducting emergency response tabletops and will provide participants with a number of ideas and considerations a planner should incorporate to enhance the productivity of this important preparedness tool.

Workshop 3: An All Hazards Approach to Recovery Planning and Crisis Management
Vicki Gavin, Barclays Bank, UK

Barclays is one of the largest financial services companies in the world. It has been involved in banking for over 300 years; operates in more than 60 countries; and employs more than 110000 people. Ensuring a consistent robust global response is no small undertaking.

To accomplish this we employ an impact based business continuity planning methodology supported by a flexible crisis management framework. This “All Hazards” approach allows us to respond to any incident regardless of the cause quickly and effectively.  The workshop will highlight the advantages of a flexible impact based model in responding to a wide variety of disparate events from terrorism to pandemic.

I will examine both the processes followed and issues faced as well as providing participants with a number of tools and techniques that may be used to implement an impact based planning model.  The workshop will be delivered as a series of exercises to provide participants an opportunity to practice using the tools and techniques discussed.

Workshop 4 - Business Impact Analysis: Foundation for Business Resilience
Russell Stewart, KPMG Europe, UK

The “black art” of business impact analysis (BIA) often provides rich pickings for consultants, being an area of endeavour that is very much open to interpretation and somewhat lacking in definition. This may be the reason why, in some quarters, the value of BIA is being questioned. However a rigorous BIA, at the appropriate level of detail, delivering accessible and re-useable data, can have a number of valuable uses. A BIA is the foundation for a business continuity management programme and, in particular, the basis for building resilience into business processes.   

The workshop will provide participants with an appreciation of BIA in two practical contexts:

  • How a BIA can be used to underpin business continuity management, and, additionally, how other functions such as insurance, engineering and maintenance planning can benefit
  • How to undertake a BIA oneself and how to represent the information in a re-useable format.

Two relatively simple analysis and modelling techniques will be demonstrated and exercised in a workshop format.