The Emergency Planning Society has launched a series of webinars – Community and City Resilience and COVID-19 – centred around Community & City Resilience and Covid19 and the various themes that encompass recovery.
Speakers throughout the series will explore recovery from a number of different perspectives including the physical and psychological human impacts, community displacement, economic factors, infrastructure, disruption to daily life and environmental issues.
To register for these free to attend events, email [email protected]
Webinar Conversation 1
This series of sharing webinars and interactive discussions hosted by the EPS was led by Professor Donald Kettl spoke about “The Foundations of Community Resilience”.
Professor Donald Kettl is the Sid Richardson Professor at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs, University of Texas, Austin. Some of his most recent articles are available to read online via the following links:
https://www.govexec.com/management/2020/03/leadership-reality-check/163850/
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/america-is-so-divided-because-federalism-isnt-working-2020-03-05
Webinar Conversation 2 – Living Life to the Full and The Environment
The second of our series was held on July 6th and we were joined by two speakers.
Caroline Douglass is Director of Incident Management and Resilience Environment Agency and spoke on “Covid 19 – Response and Restart In the Environment Agency”.
Her talk explored how the Environment Agency has used its existing incident response structures and approach to respond to Covid-19, which is a long running business continuity incident. She also discussed the agency’s approach to recovery or ‘Restart’ and the issues that have arisen – including the need to ensure we are ready for the climate emergency.
Professor Chris Williams is Director Five Areas Ltd and Emeritus Professor of Psychosocial Psychiatry University of Glasgow and explored “Living life to the full and recovering communities”.
Communities have been under pressure over recent months as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. For some this has been a time of high pressure and fear, with fears of infection, illness and death affecting themselves, family or friends. The session described the impact of various common anxiety-related conditions and how together they cause inappropriately excessive and prolonged impacts on individuals that may need formal psychological inputs to overcome.
Webinar Conversation 3 – Organisational resilience and the resilience professional and ‘new’ emergencies
The Emergency Planning Society’s series of webinars – Community and City Resilience and COVID-19 – continues with the latest event –which will explore “Organisational resilience and the resilience professional and ‘new’ emergencies”.
This webinar conversation, the third in the series, will be held on July 16th at 2pm and will feature fascinating insights from a range of speakers.
The series centres around Community & City Resilience and Covid19 and the various themes that encompass recovery. Speakers throughout the series will explore recovery from a number of different perspectives including the physical and psychological human impacts, community displacement, economic factors, infrastructure, disruption to daily life and environmental issues.
“Responding in new ways to a new kind of emergency”
The webinar’s first session will look at “Responding in new ways to a new kind of emergency” and will be led by British Red Cross Chief Executive Michael Adamson and Jehangir Malik OBE, Programme Director for the Voluntary and Community Sector Emergency Partnership with British Red Cross.
When the Government called for volunteers to support in the response to COVID-19, in just a few hours more than 40,000 people signed up to the National Volunteering Campaign.
The activities and services provided by recognised voluntary organisations and volunteers who signed up for the campaign have been of critical importance in maintaining a level of community resilience. This will continue to be important during recovery, with volunteers being the central component of social capital in the UK and therefore the heart of recovery planning.
The British Red Cross has had a pivotal role in co-ordinating the national campaign through their community reserves programme. In their session, Michael and Jehangir will explore a range of subjects including how to mobilise a large number of volunteers and provide psycho-social support, managing spontaneous volunteers, what role the Voluntary and Community Sector Emergency Partnership is taking in the response to COVID-19, how the vulnerability index has been used, understanding of unmet need to influence response and what kind of strategic role the British Red Cross will have during the planning for renewal and recovery.
The session will also look at how important the role of the volunteer is in supporting communities to heal and renew after having been in continuous ‘crisis state’ of anxiety and fear for a considerable time.
“The Eight Elements of Organisational Resilience: The Role of Resilience Professionals”
Delegates will then hear about “The Eight Elements of Organisational Resilience: The Role of Resilience Professionals” in a conversation led by Dr. Andrea Bonime-Blanc.
Dr Bonime-Blanc will discuss her model of organisational resilience which leaders – business, government or society – should consider for preparedness and resilience through times of crisis.
She will highlight the role resilience professionals should play – from governance and culture to risk and performance management, exploring how each resilience professional must play multiple roles in helping to build sustainable, value-added organisational resilience that takes care of, and benefits communities, employees, customers and others.
EPS Chair Jacqui Semple said: “This webinar conversation, the third in our series, will give delegates a great opportunity to learn more about the different roles we as resilience professionals must play in responding to a crisis, as well as the supplementary and important role volunteers can also play.”
The event is free of charge and will be held on July 16th at 2pm. To book your place, please email [email protected]
The EPS is the UK’s leading professional body for those working in resilience and emergency planning. www.the-eps.org
Our Speakers
Jehangir Malik OBE
Jehangir Malik is the Programme Director for the Voluntary and Community Sector Emergency Partnership with British Red Cross.
Previously, Jehangir has been the CEO of various faith-based organisations including Muslim Aid and Director for Islamic Relief UK focusing on faith-based humanitarian action and development, working in UK and in over Thirty countries worldwide. In 2017, Muslim Aid Team were one of the first responders to Grenfell tragedy and have remained actively engaged on numerous voluntary sector initiatives aimed at improving mechanisms within UK disaster response frameworks including the creation of VCSEP and National Emergency Trust.
In 2010, Jehangir was awarded an OBE in recognition of his 20 years of contribution to the humanitarian cause. Jehangir is on the board of trustees at ACEVO (Assoc of Chef Execs for Voluntary Orgs), founder of Muslim Charities Forum and the recently formed National Emergency Trust. Also served a Commissioner on Birmingham Children’s Commission on tackling poverty in Birmingham and a recent judge on the 2019 Civil Society Media Charity Awards.
Michael Adamson
Chief Executive – British Red Cross
Michael Adamson is Chief Executive of the British Red Cross, the country’s leading voluntary crisis response organisation, and part of the worldwide Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement.
Michael is responsible for all of the British Red Cross’ UK and International work. Prior to his current appointment, he held several other senior positions within BRC, including Managing Director of Operations. Mike has also worked as a Director of Commissioning in the NHS and spent five years as Managing Director for Services at another national charity. He began his career as an economist in management consultancy.
Michael is currently:
- Chair of Voluntary & Community Sector Emergency Partnership
- Trustee of National Emergency Trust
- Member of the NHS Prevention Board
- Trustee of Catch 22
- Member of the Foreign Secretary’s Human Rights Advisory Panel
- Trustee of the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC)
- Member of CASS External Advisory Panel for Charities Masters
Michael also chaired the NCVO review on how charities enable donors to give consent.
Andrea Bonime-Blanc, JD/PhD
Dr Bonime-Blanc is CEO and Founder of GEC Risk Advisory and a global governance, risk, ESG, ethics, cyber and crisis strategist, serving business, non-profits, and government.
Since 2017, she has served as the Independent Ethics Advisor to the Financial Oversight and Management Board for Puerto Rico.
Prior to starting her own business seven years ago, she served as senior executive at several global companies. Today she advises many executives and boards in the private and public sectors, serves on several boards of directors internationally and is a sought after keynote speaker and author of several books.
Her latest book is Gloom to Boom: How Leaders Transform Risk into Resilience and Value published by Routledge in 2020. She has just begun to write her next book “Resilience, Inc.: Futureproofing People, Planet and Profits” due in 2021.
Webinar Conversation 4
The EPS series of webinars continues with. The ‘Planning for recovery and renewal & getting the message right for our diverse communities’ session is aimed at strategic leaders, those studying within the field of resilience, crisis management, emergency planning, those who will be leading the recovery and renew strategy for Covid19 and students.
Speaking at this fascinating event will be Duncan Shaw, Professor in Operational Research and Critical Systems at University of Manchester and David Powell, Visiting Academic at the University of Manchester. Their talk, ‘Planning Recovery and Renewal of our communities’ will outline how to build resilience partnerships to develop recovery strategies and ambitious plans for renewal of their areas.
Their presentation will cover how to establish the basics of Recovery, set up a Recovery Coordinating Group, assess impacts from COVID-19 and implement recovery strategies.
The event’s second presentation will see EPS Branches Director, and internationally renowned hostage and crisis negotiator, Andrew Brown explore ‘Navigating the crisis – how to communicate effectively across our many diverse communities’.
Using techniques and tactics derived from the world of hostage and crisis negotiation, Andrew will share the insights that help to craft and facilitate effective communication to reduce uncertainty and help communities navigate the global pandemic.
Jacqui Semple, EPS Chair, said: “This series of webinars centres around Community & City Resilience and Covid19 and the various themes that encompass recovery.
“We have been incredibly grateful to our speakers throughout the series who have, and will continue to explore, recovery from a number of different fascinating perspectives including the physical and psychological human impacts, community displacement, economic factors, infrastructure, disruption to daily life and environmental issues.”
The event is free of charge and will be held on July 23rd at 2pm. To book your place or to send any questions, please email [email protected]
The EPS is the UK’s leading professional body for those working in resilience and emergency planning. www.the-eps.org
Our Speakers
Duncan Shaw, Professor in Operational Research and Critical Systems, University of Manchester
Duncan is Professor in Operational Research and Critical Systems (Alliance Manchester Business School) at the University of Manchester. He works in the Humanitarian and Conflict Response Institute focusing on social and decision making aspects of disaster planning and response including community resilience. On COVID-19 he produces the weekly Manchester Briefing (international lessons on response and recovery, available at www.ambs.ac.uk/covidrecovery).
Duncan sits on numerous research, policy, planning and evaluation committees for the European Union, United Nations, international NGOs, UK government, NGOs. He chairs a committee on Community Resilience for the International Standards Organization and wrote the standards on spontaneous volunteers (ISO22319), conducting peer reviews (ISO22392), mass evacuation (ISO22315), and vulnerable people (ISO22395).
David Powell, Visiting Academic at the University of Manchester
David is a visiting Academic with University of Manchester. Following careers in the Army and Police Service, David went on to be Head of Emergency Planning & Business Continuity for Lincolnshire County Council, and Secretariat to the Lincolnshire Resilience Forum between 2008 and 2016.
David led local and national planning to coordinate emergency responses to the Coastal Surge threat along the East Coast of the UK, working together with other LRFs, Government Departments, Cabinet Office, and national organisations such as the Environment Agency, Military and Met Office.
Andrew B Brown, Chief Security Officer
Former Commander, Chief Inspector (retd.) Andrew B Brown is an internationally renowned hostage/crisis negotiator with specialist experience in dealing with kidnap for ransom; in designing conflict de-escalation skills for military operations and acting as an expert witness to judicial inquiries on the response to hostage taking.
A Fellow of the Chartered Management and Security Institutes, he has developed advanced negotiation and crisis leadership skills for major corporations, public bodies and Olympic sports coaches. As the Chief Security Officer for a faith-based INGO he keeps staff and beneficiaries safe across the forefront of the global refugee crisis.
As a Fulbright Alumnus, he continues to teach advanced negotiation tactics to many law enforcement agencies including NYPD, USMS and the FBI. Published in his field, he remains an Advisor to the Editorial Board of the Crisis Response Journal and has been recently appointed as the Director of Branches to the Emergency Planning Society.
Webinar Conversation 5
August 5th 2020 – 2pm
‘Emerging from COVID lockdown: ‘don’t panic’ or ‘I predict a riot?’
For this fascinating webinar we will be joined by our guest speaker, Dr Chris Cocking, Principal Lecturer at the University of Brighton, who has an interest in crowd behaviour during emergencies and post disaster psycho-social support.
‘Emerging from COVID lockdown: ‘don’t panic’ or ‘I predict a riot?’ will take a detailed look into the social psychology of human behaviour during the COVID-19 pandemic, focusing on behaviour in the lead up to the lockdown (stock-piling/ ‘panic-buying’), behaviour during lockdown including spontaneous volunteering/mutual co-operation, initial compliance with lockdown restrictions and how/why such compliance can decrease.
It will also look at the emergence from lockdown and fears of increased disorder (pubs re-opening, free parties etc) and the role of public information from government and media reporting in influencing compliance (or not) with all of the above.
Dr Cocking has worked extensively in the crowd management sector, consulting at large events in the South East of England. He also advises on emergency planning, and has been a visiting speaker at the Cabinet Office Emergency Planning College.
Other consultations he has provided have been for the London Resilience Team, and the Greater London Assembly. He has been published in over 50 journals and user reports, including a case study by the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction Scientific and Technical Advisory Group, an impact study by the British Psychological Society.
He is regularly asked to speak about his research to the media, and recently contributed to media debates about public behaviour during the COVID-19 pandemic. He is also registered on the UK government’s COVID-19 Expert Database and has submitted evidence to UK Parliamentary Select Committee investigations into the pandemic.
Jacqui Semple, EPS Chair, said: “Throughout this series of webinars on Community & City Resilience and Covid-19, we have been honoured to be joined by some of the world’s leading experts in their fields, and this, the latest in the series, is no exception.
“I know this learning event will be hugely beneficial for everyone working in emergency planning, disaster management and resilience.”
Places are limited so please do register in advance to attend what is sure to be an extremely interesting event:
https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN__zz3_IQ_Q_2C-LIJDD1sxQ