Important note: These are the author's personal recollections and interpretations, which are likely to suffer from errors and selectivity. There is no endorsement from the IET or the speakers.
Subtitle: "Supporting Each Other Before, During and After a Crisis"
We had four speakers, each bringing his specialist expertise and knowledge to our panel:
- Richard Barnes, former Statutory Deputy Mayor of London, former Member of The Board, Transport for London and former Deputy Chair of the Metropolitan Police Authority
- Robert Hall, London First Director, Security & Resilience Network
- David Allen-Rogers, Resilience lead from Alchemmy Consulting
- Ross Tuffee, Sales Director, Dogfi.sh
First up, we heard from Richard who took us through the London First 'Resilience First' initiative which has the aim of advancing resilience for business communities.
To start with, the word 'resilience' has become surprisingly populist: there are numerous examples of usage with differing nuances of meaning. From the high street, through house prices to natural disasters and terrorist incidents.
Contrary to our own beliefs, indicated by a show of hands, London is not reckoned to be resilient, in comparison with other major cities, such as Toronto. We need resilience because we live in a world defined by disruption.
Resilience is the ability to rise above shocks and stresses. We need to: Anticipate before, absorb during and adapt afterwards. We want the ability after a crisis not so much as to 'bounce back' as to 'bounce forward'.
It's possible to reduce the financial losses: each pound spent on prevention could yield fifteen in savings.
We need a step change in approach (working with their partners: Alchemmy and Dogfi.sh) to achieve business community resilience: To enable communities survive and thrive by cross-functional communication and cooperation. Picture three overlapping circles: The will (behaviours), the means (resources) and the ideas (plans and procedures).
Richard gave us many, good illustrative examples: such as knowing which residents are vulnerable, where they are and having efficient communications with all residents. Communities are the key to resilience.
Robert was up second, giving us more insight into the networks, security and the impacts on resilience.
David provided us with a linking section, recapping on the themes that were emerging: It's not just about crisis management, we could be facing transport upheavals, flood, fire. All groups need to take part, to communicate and work together.
Can we measure resilience? How? By looking at resilience behaviours using the concept of ARC: Application for Resilient Communities.
This was the cue for Ross to expand on ARC.
Ross pointed out that searches for phrases such as "Terrorist Attacks" on Google peaked dramatically when the Westminster Bridge incident happened, yet was soon out of our collective mind again.
ARC is a mobile app platform with the aims of driving engagement and behaviour change: Trigger, Investment, Reward, Action (Refer to the book 'Hooked' by Nir Eyal).
Swipe up as a simple action is now embedded in our behaviour (as may be swipe left!). Facebook only moved to mobile platforms to create a habit, so that it became a part of day to day life. A system needs to get people to invest in it by interacting with it, posting, 'likes'.
Where do we get our information from? Many sources, some dubious. Where to find best practice? That is trustworthy and accessible? We want to be able to study it and share it.
The app allows you to assess the resilience of your community, using an interactive chatbot, giving a score. There is also a dashboard with trends and resilience ranking.
The Q & A session posed a good number of thoughtful questions from the fully-engaged audience, triggering wide-ranging and thought-provoking responses.
Many thanks to our panel of speakers informing us so well, to Xen Christodoulou for organising the event and to the IET & Savoy Place staff for their super support.
For more information, visit The ARC Platform
You may be interested in an upcoming workshop:
LONDON FIRST: MAKING RESILIENCE WORK FOR EVERYONE WORKSHOP
30 November 2017
Grand Hall, Olympia, London