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Our speakers will share how Texas worked with federal, state, and local organizations to further develop continuity policy and guidance documents, such as the Continuity Guidance Circular (FEMA, 2018). They will also share current resources and opportunities for collaboration available to continuity practitioners to create a continuity community. Their efforts in tearing down silos and creating cross-sector collaboration will be presented along with their plans for the future in bringing private and non-profit organizations into conversations with government.

With natural disasters on the rise and cyber attacks on the nightly news, are state governments ready to meet the challenges and risks of the modern world? For the state of Maryland, the answer to that question is a resounding YES! Attend this session to hear how Maryland state emergency managers are taking a uniquely effective approach to improving resilience: Training! A two-year program aims to increase resiliency by cross-training staff in business continuity, IT disaster recovery, and cyber resilience. Attend this session to learn how it’s working as well as how this approach also benefits both the private sector and public-private partnership initiatives.

The Fire Protection Department of Saudi Aramco has taken proactive measures and demonstrated resiliency by sustaining continuity of operation during recent major disruptive events. They launched a comprehensive study for the business continuity plan to be aligned with the Center for Public Safety Excellence (CPSE) requirements, international organization for standardization (ISO) requirements, and Cooperate Internal Operation Excellence Model which have minimized information and asset losses and played a significant role assisting the recovery and restoration of business normal operations in a timely manner. This will be an exciting and informative session and not limited to the following: business continuity planning and critical elements, risk and threat identification methodology, and leveraging GIS technology in emergency management.

Using Costa Rica as a reference for the Business Continuity Management in Latin America, this presentation makes a review of the public management in the face of the COVID-19 emergency for management of institutional continuity, management of financial sustainability for the continuity of critical public services and management and state of the continuity of public services in the emergency.

In March of 2018, the City of Atlanta, GA was the subject of a massive cyberattack. Many city services and programs were affected by the ransomware attack, including online services for citizens to pay bills and request utility service. The attack was notable for the extent of services affected and the duration of service outages, as well as the importance of Atlanta as a major American economic and transportation hub. Attend this session to hear lessons learned from the attack and learn how you can transform and strengthen your organizations cyber-resilience through operational effectiveness, change management, and business continuity.

Morgan Jones, AVP at the New York City Economic Development Corporation describes his Hurricane Sandy Experience. Morgan A. Jones is AVP at the New York City Economic Development Corporation. Previously, Jones was Chief Operating Officer of the US-China Strong Foundation, Senior Emergency Management Specialist at NYU Langone Medical Center. Mr. Jones also served at the NYC Mayor’s Community Affairs Unit (CAU) and the Mayor’s Office of Housing Recovery under Mayors Michael R. Bloomberg and Bill de Blasio from 2010-2015.

When a sudden devastating flood put a public-private partnership to the test, results were remarkable! Ryan Miller, CBCP, CBCLA, Director of Emergency Management for Howard County, MD, and Larry Twele, CEO of Howard County Economic Development Authority, offer lessons learned in recovering from a record-breaking flood – and detail the partnership between emergency management and economic development as one of the key elements that resulted in more than 95% of businesses surviving! You’ll learn about the plans in place before the flood, the immediate response, and how to create a meaningful partnership between public and private resources. For additional context, watch the NBC Nightly News coverage of the flood here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9WgI9bUUsJM

Streamlining business continuity management as an integral part of the emergency management framework, the Organizational Resilience Management System (ORMS) comprises crisis management, ICT disaster recovery, security, medical, staff support, crisis communications, records, facilities management and BCM. The ORMS at the UN provides an effective means to integrate and harmonize the emergency management activities. The ORMS provides a framework for cooperation across institutional silos and between the various actors responsible for the key components.

We all know that relationships between public agencies and private sector organizations must be established prior to a crisis situation. While it doesn’t always happen, there seems to be a concerted effort by both sides to reach out. Now let’s go beyond that basic concept and get down to the nitty gritty. How exactly should and can public agencies and private organizations interface during an incident? How best to provide mutual aid? How can everyone do their respective jobs without getting in each other’s way? What do you need to know about preserving a scene/protecting evidence? Attend this session for real-world examples and practical advice.

Private and public sectors are continually discovering new ways to evolve from the traditional emergency response mind-set to a fully integrated response in a joint operational environment. Too often an incident impacts multiple parts of our community with only a limited amount of stakeholders responding. As a result of recent incidents, private and public sectors have capitalized on opportunities that have been uncovered through working together. This presentation will highlight those opportunities.

Earthquakes and numerous other passive threats to business continuity are challenging from a planning perspective because we can't predict when they might strike and how severe the impact will be. However, nearly all of the downstream, post-incident impacts can be anticipated and addressed pre-incident. A cutting-edge, comprehensive program at DreamWorks (the first of its kind in southern California) will provide attendees with tangible, specific examples of how to proactively prepare for crisis. Earthquakes provide a very topical and relevant foundation for this discussion, but the strategic framework put forth in this presentation can be overlaid onto virtually any crisis.

John Franchy provides a high-level overview of some of the supply chain challenges in the federal space and the organizational challenges faced by government business continuity practitioners in managing those risks. John alsos describe how a public sector continuity program works and ways to increase program efficiency and effectiveness through the implementation of a workforce training, certification, and process framework.