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0:00
Good day.
As you can see from the slide
I am affiliated with the George
Washington University Institute
for Crisis Disaster and Risk
Management, which resides
in the School of Engineering
and Applied Science at
the George Washington
University in Washington, D.C.
This is the only such
program in the United States
that is anchored in
an engineering school.
And we find this to
be very successful.
Our focus is on crisis
emergency and risk
management as a management science.
And we have been very successful
over the years with our students,
assuming positions of
great responsibility
within the private sector,
or the not-for-profit sector,
and the government at all levels.
0:44
As a matter of introduction,
my name is Greg Shaw.
And I've spent 27 years in
the United States Coast Guard
with 12 years of operational
duty afloat and ashore,
and commanded four
ships, or as we call
them in the Coast Guard cutters.
This operational type experience
required significant risk
management and risk-informed
decision making in which
I attempted to balance the life
and safety issues of my crew,
and my ships, and my unit
with our mission requirements.
As I go through the presentation
I'll talk about guiding principles.
But at this point I need to
say that the safety of my crew
and the protection of our cutter was
the central focus of my decision.
This is true of any
organization in any sector.
My last assignment in the
United States Coast Guard
was commanding officer of
Coast Guard headquarters.
And this tweaked my interest
in continuity of operations.
When I assumed this position I noted
that we had no plan for continuity
of operations, despite the fact
that our headquarters building which
housed over 2,400
people and provided
support for the entire Coast Guard,
was in a very flood-prone location.
So I decided to engage the
leadership of the Coast Guard
in an effort to prepare
to perform our highest
priority tasks in the face of
any type of disruptive event.
This is what I would call
applied risk management,
where we looked at different things
that could impact us adversely,
and what we needed to do to fix
them, and what types of resources
we needed to devote to this.
Luckily, during the period of
time, the two years that I was
the commanding officer
at the headquarters,
we didn't have any
disruptive events.
However, after leaving that
position some four years
later a major flood damaged
the headquarters building
and shut down the phone system,
and the electrical system,
and required a complete closure
of the building for 27 days.
Some of the members
of the headquarters staff
it was an extended holiday.
But for many more, the
plans that we had developed
allowed them to accomplish
the vital operations
to support the Coast Guard.
And this experience led me to seek
the certified business continuity
professional certification through
Disaster Recovery Institute
International and supported my
private consulting that I've
done over the past 10 to 12 years.
For the past 14 years I've
worked with George
Washington University
in administrative,
research, and faculty positions.
And as of August 31st of this
year I'll finally retire full time
while still teaching
online and doing
lectures for several
of the universities.
