Two Sides of the Coin!
The resilience industry is booming!
Recent publications by the British Standards Institute, The Economist Business Unit, PwC and Control Risks, highlight the fact that while there is still some way to go in terms of implementation, resilience is being identified and accepted as an essential component of an organisations success. Make no mistake, while early days, this is a comprehensive win and should be considered an important first step in the long journey that will follow.
Another commonality shared in these publications is the growing recognition that resilience is finally being accepted as a “holistic” and “aspirational” approach and while it is agreed that it is comprised of various disciplines, it is essentially operating in two halves, “strategic” and “operational”. At a strategic level, there is a need to be able to convey the message that executives and senior department heads need, to not only understand resilience, they need to support it. Operationally, the demands are obvious, the various elements of security, crisis, emergency, continuity, etc. working in synergy to identify, protect and maintain a level of protection against disruption.
There seems little doubt that this two fold approach will present some issues going forward. Given the wide variance in current practitioner’s skillsets, who, generally speaking, could be considered “specialist”, often operating within only one area of resilience. While the debate as to who will ultimately own resilience within organisations is set to continue, the early signs are that it will more than likely remain within the operational environment. Of course, the strategic communication piece will be essential to offer greater levels of support to practitioners, in both the short and long term and ultimately will be the true test of any resilience programme.
Recognition, growth and reward are all attractive benefits of the emerging resilience industry, however while all should be included in this success, it will be important to determine who will operate at each level. Abandonment over advancement, will not serve our industry well, it will take a determined and clinical approach to identify the ‘who’s who” of the resilience world. Like any other industry it should not be assumed that participation leads to leadership, we should look to those who can see both sides of the coin, focus on one or the other or in rare cases, perform both!
Director at Stretch Think | Associate Professor in Crisis Management | Helping teams build futures thinking
9 年It will be very interesting to see what guidance ISO 22316 - Organizational Resilience will provide future practitioners working in this field.
Head of Security, Nordics
9 年Hey Paul, great points...my money is on risk management (generally) to be the initial flag bearer for resilience. The CRO or equivalent to be heavily involved in the early stages over the next few years. The other leading diciplines have all had a run, however are too limited in scope, the other contenders could be CTO's and COO's, especially given the activity around cyber and change management in most organisations.
Head of Resilience
9 年I wonder whether a particular discipline will be given prominence Jason, or if it will be the most qualified person from within the broader remit of resilience who will run the new game? As the demand for people is going to far outstrip the current supply, it might be more a case of who can head it up, rather than which area we want to give the lead to? I know the 10,000 hour rule has come into question; but I still believe The Role of Deliberate Practice in the Acquisition of Expert Performance, concept written by Anders Ericsson in 1993 and made famous by Malcolm Gladwell in his book, Outliers, holds weight here As an industry, we need experienced ‘10,000-hours+’ people who have retained the foresight and innovative mindset to move us forward… whilst delivering on the ever growing need for people on both the strategic and operational fronts to enable all organisations and communities to benefit from the best resilience available .
Contracting services: Engineering | Technical contingency solutions | Robotics and Automation | Resilience Consultations | ISO implementation, training, auditing - and much more.
9 年And not to forget the edge of the coin - as the third side is what escapes most - the capability of individuals to "harbour" both sides with equal respect.