Crisis Talks

Ellis Brover is the former CIO of Toyota Australia and an Independent Board and Executive IT Advisor. He has a proven track record over three decades of building and leading world-class IT organisations and his experience spans a range of roles and industries, from startups to multi-nationals. In this episode of Crisis Talks, we talk about the changing IT landscape over the past few decades, the nature of cyber threats and how they have evolved, and the importance building trust in your crisis teams when preparing for the worst case. We delve into one of his experiences as the CIO of a globally recognised brand that was targeted by an extremely complex cyber attack. His experience navigating the challenges of a cyber crisis is a must listen for business leaders, IT executives and cyber teams in any organisation.

“Data should be treated as a liability - not an asset” - Attorney General, Mark Dreyfus

With recent high profile cyber attacks targeting Medibank and Optus, Australian boards are scrambling  to understand the risks a cyber attack may present to them and what they can do to prevent, prepare and respond. In this episode of Crisis Talks, I speak with Claire Pales and Anna Liebel, Co- directors of The Secure Board, and co authors of the book with the same title.  

They share their insights into how a board’s understanding of risk management can be applied to cyber risks and how boards and executive teams can further enhance their cyber resilience. 

We discuss the following :

• Data privacy and governance

“Don't look at these events as black swans… I don't think any business should plan around what if, every business should plan on when.”  

 Thomas Knudsen 

Thomas Knudsen is the Managing Director of global supply chain business Toll. Having previously lived through the global cyber attack at Maersk, he joined the business as the head of their Global Forwarding Division before being appointed Managing Director in January 2020. At this time, Australia was emerging from the disruptions of the Black Saturday Fires however further serious challenges were ahead. Toll was shortly thereafter the victim of two Global Cyber Attacks, whilst the onset of the global COVID pandemic was starting to wreak havoc on global supply chains.

One of these crisis events alone would normally have crippled a business, however Toll has navigated its way through these crises and is emerging more resilient and stronger than ever. Thomas shares his insights into these events and the lessons he learnt from these in preparedness, planning, leadership, mindset, purpose, and supply chain resilience. 

From a career as a journalist working as a police reporter covering some of the worst crimes in Victoria’s history to the Executive General Manager Corporate Affairs, Government and Communications at the Australian Football League, Brian Walsh has had an amazing career in issues and crisis management. In this interview on Crisis Talks, we talk about his formative years as a journalist and how the “high emotion” of dealing with people on their worst day helped prepare him for his role in a highly emotive and high profile industry he works in now. 

Brian discusses the importance of empathy and starting with the truth in any situation and how organisations that seek always to “do the right thing” in line with the purpose and values of the organisation tend to navigate their way through any issues. Brian shares some amazing insights into the league’s inner workings through COVID and the way they engaged with the different government, community and other stakeholders to deliver two successful seasons despite the logistics challenges they faced.  This episode is a must listen for anyone that is in the corporate affairs and issues management space, or anyone that is interested in the way that sports governing bodies navigate different stakeholder landscapes. 

11 Years on from the Anniversary of the Deepwater Horizon Crisis, we pick up from the moment the Crisis team observes the Deepwater Horizon Oil Rig sinking in the Gulf of Mexico and the subsequent environmental disaster that ensued.

In this episode, we talk through the shift in the response objective from People to the Environment and the realisation that Clint and others felt when confronted by the enormity of the environmental catastrophe. Importantly, we also explored the indelible impact that this disaster had on Clint and his colleagues and the juxtaposition of their desire to respond professionally, whilst acknowledging the failures that led to the incident occurring. 

This series is an excellent insight into the importance of integrating risk management, prevention, preparedness, response and recovery under one consistent framework, and the impact that these events have on the people who are charged with responding to them. 

On the 20th April 2010, an explosion on the Deepwater Horizon Oil Rig in the Gulf of Mexico killed 11 workers, injured 17 more and resulted in the largest marine OilSpill in history. 

Clint Honeycutt was one of the BP Health and Safety Advisors at the time and was activated as a part of the Company Incident Management Team to respond to the incident.

In this multi part series, we discuss his experience working through the immediate response as a part of the incident management team. We discuss the following: 

• Oil and Gas Emergency Preparedness Arrangements

Clint Honeycutt is the Global HSE Director for Lufkin Industries and 11 years ago he was a Health and Safety Advisor working for BP in the Gulf of Mexico. Prior to working with BP, he had served in the US Navy and the National Guard and had built a successful working from heights business with his father. Since his time at BP, Clint has held senior Health, Safety and Environment roles with prominent Oil and Gas companies such as BHP, Hess, TD Williamson and now Lufkin Industries. 

From a 15 year old volunteer firefighter in Duffy’s Forest Fire Brigade in 1985 to leading 70,000 firefighters during the response to the 2019-2020 fires, Shane Fitzsimmons rise to being the most trusted face in the bushfire crisis has been a story of resilience, hardship and humility. From losing his father in a routine back-burning operation to overseeing the fire season which claimed the lives of community, volunteer and international firefighting professionals, the qualities that stood out to all of us was his calmness, empathy and authenticity. 

In this episode of Crisis Talks we talk about the season that was; his insights into crisis leadership; what his new role as Resilience Commissioner holds for him; and the leadership legacy he wishes to leave. 

With thousands of Australians still stranded overseas due to the pandemic, I thought it was important to share the story of one man’s success despite another stunning failure of Australian Bureaucracy. 

Shocked by a sudden and harsh lockdown in India in the early days of the pandemic, thousands of Australians turned to their High Commission and Foreign Affairs teams for advice on what to do, only to be told that there was no plan to help get them home. Enter Sanskrit student and English Teacher Simon Quinn, who wouldn't take no for an answer and set about coordinating his own repatriation plan, armed only with a facebook page and loads of initiative.

In this episode of Crisis Talks, hear the story of an unlikely hero’s success in repatriating over 2000 Australians home when our government couldn't. 

“The leaders who can lead from a place of compassion and empathy and really understand that we are all suffering, then I think they’ll achieve great things.”  

Interested in an expert’s perspective on the US’ response to the pandemic? Regina Phelps is an internationally recognised expert in the field of crisis management, continuity planning and exercise design. She is the founder of EMS Solutions Inc, (EMSS) and since 1982, EMSS has provided consultation and speaking services to clients in four continents.

During this episode we compare the US’ pandemic response with Australia’s; we discuss the difficulty in delivering a consistent strategy in any crisis; the importance of leadership during a crisis; and how more women can get involved in the field of emergency and crisis management.