Disaster Planning, Crisis Management and Recovery

To what extent should major projects plan for and take account of potential disasters and how can we best recover after chaotic events have taken place?

We shall adopt the following definitions:

• Disaster: A sudden event, such as an accident or a natural catastrophe, that causes great damage or loss of life. It is the consequences of a disastrous event and the inability of its victims to cope with them that constitute a disaster, not the event itself.
• Crisis Management. Strategically directed activities to prevent, respond to, mitigate the effects and lead to the recovery from the crisis.
• Recovery: Is the process, policies and procedures related to preparing for recovery or continuation of technology/infrastructure critical to a project after a natural or human-induced disaster.

The half day seminar will run with two parts: firstly, scenario planning, choosing which risks to mitigate against, and deciding on the level of investment; and secondly, detecting the earliest signs of impending disaster and recovering the situation (compared to plan?) once the event has occurred.

Our Chair for this seminar brings substantive experience from military operations, planning at Government level and advising pan-government organisations in anticipating, planning for and recovering significant disasters, both man-made and natural.

We shall hear from an expert in nuclear power generation stations and learn from comparisons between existing power plants and the designs for the next generation, together with lessons for all projects post Fukushima.

With post analysis from BP’s handling of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill at Board level, we will gain an insight to lessons for corporate governance at three levels – in-field, in-country and at HQ.

Finally we shall hear from someone who had planned for a natural event and then had to put in place his own plan for recovery!