admin – Swan Island Networks https://www.swanislandnetworks.com Mon, 31 Mar 2025 08:08:18 +0000 en hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=5.8.11 https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/cropped-favicon_16-32x32.png admin – Swan Island Networks https://www.swanislandnetworks.com 32 32 UnitedHealthcare CEO Shooting https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/unitedhealthcare-ceo-shooting?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=unitedhealthcare-ceo-shooting Tue, 25 Mar 2025 16:31:16 +0000 https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/?p=13612

UnitedHealthcare CEO Shooting

February 2025

Looking southwest down 6th Avenue and across 54th Street at Hilton on a cloudy afternoon.

New York Hilton Midtown at 6th Avenue and 54th St

Brian Thompson, the CEO of UnitedHealthcare since 2021, was killed in Midtown Manhattan on December 4th, 2024 after being shot in the back around 6:44 AM outside the New York Hilton Midtown where he was attending an investors’ meeting for UnitedHealth Group. The assailant fled the scene on an e-bike, prompting a wide-scale manhunt and investigation.

Three fired cartridge cases and three unfired cartridges were found at the scene with the words “delay”, “deny”, and “depose” inscribed on them, similar to the similar insurance industry phrase “delay, deny, defend,” which alludes to insurance companies’ efforts to avoid paying claims. A water bottle, candy wrapper, and phone were recovered from the scene and are believed to be connected to the shooter while a backpack containing a Tommy Hilfiger jacket and Monopoly money was found in Central Park.

Surveillance footage captured images of the suspect at a hostel and a café before the attack, and law enforcement offered a combined reward of up to $60,000 for information leading to his arrest. Luigi Mangione, a Maryland native last known to reside in Honolulu, was apprehended in Altoona, Pennsylvania, on December 9, 2024, after being recognized at a McDonald’s. Upon his arrest, authorities found a 3D-printed firearm, a suppressor, and a falsified ID. A handwritten letter found in his possession expressed his resentment toward the U.S. healthcare system, describing the industry as corrupt and exploitative. Initially charged with firearms offenses and forgery in Pennsylvania, Mangione was later extradited to New York, where he faced upgraded charges, including first-degree murder as an act of terrorism. Federal charges followed, making him eligible for the death penalty.

The New York Times; aerial scene from Google Earth

Investigators believe Mangione’s motive stemmed from hostility toward the health insurance industry, possibly linked to his personal medical history, including an injury that led to emergency treatment in 2023. Online activity suggests he held strong views on corporate influence over healthcare. Authorities also cited possible ideological influences, referencing his review of Ted Kaczynski’s writings. Mangione has pleaded not guilty to all charges, and his defense team argues that media attention has compromised his right to a fair trial.

Reactions and Aftermath

Reactions have been polarized. Opinion polls have shown younger and left-leaning respondents more likely to support Mangione. There was widespread contempt and mockery toward Thompson and UnitedHealth Group, and sympathy and praise for Mangione on social media. Supporters started crowdfunding campaigns to cover Mangione’s legal costs. One GiveSendGo fundraiser has raised over $425,000 as of February 2025.

Graffiti on Avenue A.

“Deny Defend Depose” graffiti in New York City

Comrade Workwear, a socialist apparel brand, planned to release a deck of “most wanted CEOs” playing cards inspired by the 2003 U.S. military’s most-wanted Iraqi deck. Founder James Harr announced the project on TikTok, assigning each suit to different industries and soliciting user feedback. Harr, who celebrated the recent murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson as “good news,” emphasized that while individual CEO deaths are “awesome,” systemic change requires broader action. He framed the cards as a tool for workers to understand corporate power and criticized media focus on Thompson’s death over broader economic injustices.

James Carr created the Most Wanted CEO Playing Cards (Image via Comrade Workwear)

Corporate Response

UnitedHealthcare, Blue Cross Blue Shield, and CVS Health removed photographs and other information about their executive leadership from their websites following Thompson’s killing. Security firms saw a surge in inquiries about protective services for CEOs. UnitedHealth Group CEO Andrew Witty defended the company’s claim denial practices. The company hired a defamation law firm to take action against social media posts critical of the company.

Related Incidents

A woman in Florida was arrested for threatening Blue Cross Blue Shield after her claim was denied, echoing the words written on the cartridge cases found at the scene of Thompson’s killing. Another woman was arrested at the United States Capitol and charged with plotting to kill billionaire investor Scott Bessent, stating she was inspired by Mangione.

Assessment

  • Thompson’s killing and Mangione’s ideological motivations signal rising hostility toward the healthcare industry, which may lead to further security threats against executives

  • The strong public support for Mangione, particularly among younger and left-leaning groups, suggests growing anti-corporate sentiment that could fuel similar incidents

  • Insurers and other large corporations will likely continue to limit public visibility of executives while increasing security measures

  • The response from brands like Comrade Workwear reflects a shift in how corporate leaders are portrayed, normalizing anti-executive rhetoric

  • Law enforcement will likely treat future threats against business leaders with heightened scrutiny, particularly those linked to broader social and economic grievances

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]]> Israel-Hamas Conflict and Regional Escalations https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/israel-hamas-conflict?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=israel-hamas-conflict Mon, 10 Mar 2025 22:48:23 +0000 https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/?p=13548

Israel-Hamas Conflict and Regional Escalations

On October 7, 2023, Hamas and allied Palestinian militant factions launched a large-scale attack against Israel from the Gaza Strip, coinciding with the Jewish holiday of Simchat Torah. The assault began with a rocket barrage of at least 4,300 missiles targeting Israeli cities, followed by a coordinated infiltration by land, sea, and air. 

More than 5,000 Hamas militants breached the Gaza-Israel barrier, attacking military installations and civilian communities, including Be’eri, Kfar Aza, Nir Oz, Netiv Ha’asara, and Sderot. A major target of the assault was the Nova Music Festival in Re’im, where 364 civilians were killed.

On October 7th, nearly 1,200 people were confirmed killed, including 695 Israeli civilians, 71 foreign nationals, and 373 security personnel. Hamas militants abducted 251 Israeli civilians and soldiers, transporting them to Gaza. The October 7th massacre is considered the most deadly terrorist attack per capita, in data compiled since the 1970s.

Casualty reports from Gaza’s Health Ministry indicate over 45,000 Palestinian fatalities since October 7, 2023. Much of the Gaza Strip’s infrastructure has been destroyed.

Israeli Military Response and Gaza War

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) initiated immediate operations to repel the incursion, regaining complete control of all infiltrated areas within 72 hours. The conflict escalated into full-scale war, with Israel launching airstrikes on Gaza beginning October 7, followed by a ground invasion beginning on October 27.

Casualty reports from Gaza’s Health Ministry indicate over 45,000 Palestinian fatalities since October 7, 2023. Much of the Gaza Strip’s infrastructure has been destroyed.

Ceasefires and Hostage Exchanges

  • November 22, 2023: A temporary ceasefire enabled the release of 50 hostages held by Hamas in exchange for a pause in hostilities. Fighting resumed on December 1.
  • January 19, 2025: A second ceasefire led to the release of 33 Israeli hostages in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners. On March 1, 2025 the ceasefire collapsed; negotiations are currently ongoing.

Regional Escalation and Iranian Proxy Involvement

Iran’s Role

Iran has played a central role in supporting Hamas and its allied factions through funding, training, and operational coordination. Following October 7, the conflict expanded into a broader regional confrontation:

  • April 13, 2024: Iran and its proxies (Hezbollah, Houthis, other Islamic factions in Syrian and Iraq) launched approximately 300 missiles and drones at Israel.
  • April 19, 2024: Israel allegedly retaliated with airstrikes on strategic sites in Iran.
  • July 31, 2024: Israel assassinated Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran.
  • October 1, 2024: Iran launched another missile salvo at Israel; Israel responded with covert operations, publicly acknowledging a strike inside Iranian territory for the first time.

Israel’s Iron Dome anti-missile system intercepts rockets

Hezbollah (Lebanon)

  • October 8, 2023: Hezbollah initiated cross-border attacks on northern Israel, escalating into a sustained conflict.
  • Over 96,000 Israelis and 1 million Lebanese civilians were displaced due to the fighting.
  • September 2024: A large-scale operation resulted in the simultaneous detonation of thousands of Hezbollah communication devices, killing dozens and injuring thousands. Israel claimed responsibility. Separately, Hezbollah’s Secretary General, Hassan Nasrallah, and other senior leaders were assassinated in targeted operations.
  • November 27, 2024: A ceasefire agreement was brokered by an international coalition, temporarily ending major hostilities.Israel’s Iron Dome anti-missile system intercepts rockets

Houthis (Yemen)

  • October 19, 2023: Iran-backed Houthi militants launched missile and drone attacks on Israel, including strikes on Tel Aviv.
  • In the aftermath of October 7th,  the group also targeted international shipping vessels in the Red Sea, forcing major commercial route diversions and impacting supply chain and the broader economy.
  • U.S. and coalition forces launched targeted strikes against Houthi targets to secure maritime trade routes.

Assessment

  • The Israel-Hamas war has evolved into a multi-front regional conflict involving Iranian proxies across Lebanon, Yemen, Syria, Iraq and beyond.

  • Despite ceasefires, escalations indicate continued instability, with the potential for renewed full-scale hostilities.

  • Ongoing international mediation efforts remain crucial in preventing further escalation and broader regional war.

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]]> Corporate Security Predictions and Trends https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/corporate-security-predictions-2021?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=corporate-security-predictions-2021 Fri, 30 Oct 2020 20:19:34 +0000 https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/?p=9006

Corporate Security Predictions and Trends

2021 corporate security predictions by Swan Island Networks
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2021 is approaching rapidly, though 2020 seems to be lasting an eternity. Most organizations are planning for whatever new normal will emerge in the coming months and thinking about longer-term trends that will impact our people, markets, operations, and economy for decades. Many are struggling, making hard choices to ensure day-to-day and month-to-month survival.

Multinational companies must juggle thousands of different situations and regulations across their various sub-jurisdictions around the planet, multiplying the complexity of their operations. Many more companies may operate in a limited area, but are dependent on supply chains that span the globe. The COVID-19 pandemic is a stubborn foe and has defied (so far) any kind of “silver bullet” such as the vaccine which finally brought polio under control in the 50s. It’s a challenging time for all of us.

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Corporate Security Predictions & Trends 2021 [PDF]

"It is the long history of humankind (and animal kind, too) that those who learned to collaborate and improvise most effectively have prevailed."

Charles Darwin*

*(The University of Cambridge’s Darwin Correspondence Project tells us Darwin didn’t say this, but he should have!)

The team at Swan Island Networks has built a collection of corporate security predictions and trends that we think will impact your security world and overall organization in the next 18 months, directly and indirectly. Our company lives in this rapidly changing security ecosystem and we interact with a broad range of customers, partners, “coopetitors” and competitors, so our forecast includes many of these collaborations and discussions. 

Our predictions are also informed by the conversations that occurred in a virtual executive roundtable I hosted for ten consecutive weeks as the COVID-19 virus spiked. Attendees highlighted significant problems that weren’t always obvious, such as elevator choke points for high rise, multi-tenant buildings. Everyone shared real-time insights, including input from one participant living through the stages of the virus – symptoms, testing, contact tracing challenges, and recovery. 

Change continues to be a constant, and new developments are happening at a stunning pace, so I’m sure we’ll find we missed the mark on some predictions and were eerily right on others. 

1. Uncertainty and speed of change

The world has been accelerating in many areas for decades, and we know this rapid pace is going to continue. Our prediction centers around how organizations will reframe how they manage change. We anticipate most companies will spend more resources monitoring emerging events in order to prevent or mitigate damages—examining secondary and tertiary areas of impact due to the rising complexity they are encountering. 

The pandemic has sharpened everyone’s sense of awareness, and most companies have experienced events that might have been foreseen, prevented, or at least mitigated if someone had been paying closer attention. Never have the phrases “pay me now or pay me later” and “if you snooze, you lose” had as much impact. The roller coaster is going faster. Buckle up.

We anticipate most companies will spend more resources monitoring emerging events in order to prevent or mitigate damages—examining secondary and tertiary areas of impact due to the rising complexity they are encountering.

2. Uneven pandemic and economic recovery

The economic recovery is seesawing almost everywhere, forcing many organizations and communities to open, close, move a phase back, open schools, and in some cases immediately reclose them. Spain has reverted to a severe infection state, so worldwide diligence clearly must be a sustained 24×7 effort until vaccines show up and impact the majority of global populations. This uncertainty will ripple through companies and impact their staffing and security postures. It’s hard to define a trend here, but we have seen flexibility, innovation and rapid adoption of new methods by the firms handling this the most effectively. We predict the sense of urgency gained will continue and be a benefit to future days.

3. Civil unrest and crime

Worldwide, the number of unemployed people has skyrocketed. The pandemic is ac-celerating income inequality issues as people with few resources to begin with have to spend what little they have on keeping the lights on, food on the table or look to stressed community programs for help. Rising levels of desperation, frustration and anger drive antisocial behaviors and domestic violence. Legitimate protests against racial injustice are increasingly being marred by opportunistic violence and looting. We’ve al-ready seen spikes of shootings and murders in several major US cities. We’re predicting an unpredictable global situation where careful monitoring and early reactions will help mitigate damages for organizations and communities.

4. Threat awareness

Companies that were prepared and ready for the pandemic should take a bow (with their mask on), because most organizations got a big collection of surprises and negative impacts. We work with several companies who were aware of the virus early on, modified an already existing pandemic plan, augmented PPE on hand, and reaped the benefits. Our prediction is that many more companies will adopt 24×7 all-hazards threat monitoring as a “must have” corporate security function, and devote more dollars to contingency planning and capability. We also predict, as with cyber-security, the board and C-Suite will take a more engaged role in managing and directing this effort.

5. Outbreaks - virus recurrence

Security personnel are essential personnel, and vulnerable to exposure despite good training and guidance by the security firms. We predict a major trend will be workforce uncertainty and contingency planning for personnel and systems impacted by a sudden recurrence of the virus. We also predict that testing and screening will become more precise and have nearly instant results, allowing companies to pinpoint problems earlier and adjust responses closer to real time.

6. Commercial real estate in flux

Few prognosticators are willing to predict the state of commercial real estate for the next five years. One can make the case that people will continue to work from home, or that emerging satellite-based high-speed Internet connections will allow a permanent exodus from major metropolitan areas – if you can connect, can you really work anywhere? None of this is proven or certain; the outcomes will have impacts that could affect every aspect of future security efforts.  

I predict a mixed environment going forward because critical talent will be able to dictate their preferences in many cases, making a uniform or dictatorial approach by management difficult. The digital collaboration environment is here to stay. Companies should prepare to incorporate home addresses into threat monitoring to manage the distributed cybersecurity danger. 

The digital collaboration environment is here to say.

7. Silo merging - budgets

For some companies, 2021 will demand some very harsh changes in personnel and spending to support the survival of the organization. For essential services like security, the answer will be doing more with less, driving our prediction that companies will assess the cost/value relationship of the tools they are using, evaluating competitive solutions that either cost less, offer more value, or provide more flexibility.  

8. Silo merging - effectiveness

We’ve seen a trend toward merging enterprise resource management (ERM), business continuity, and physical and cyber security into a unified risk/security structure that gains some economies of scale and centralizes responsibility for the C-suite and board of directors. Too many companies have been disappointed or blindsided by the lack of cohesiveness between the strategic, operational and tactical functions responsible for protecting the corporation. 

9. Cybersecurity

Cyber is going to continue as a top threat for corporations, complicated by work-at-home flexibility. We’re predicting a couple of major breaches where CISOs didn’t segregate work computing from family computing, and home users’ access from the corporate crown jewels. Hackers will either lock down sites (ransomware) or steal very valuable intellectual property. 

10. LEO satellite-enabled security

Getting the bandwidth for monitoring far-flung pipelines, property, and assets has been a challenge – even many in the US and other developed countries are bandwidth-chal-lenged in rural areas. The LEO satellite constellations by SpaceX and Amazon’s Kupier project promise to deliver 4G+ speed bandwidth to every inch of the planet. Besides enabling very remote work from home locations, we predict a surge in security sensors of great variety that can relay geospatial-enabled alerts to government and industry very quickly, broadening the proactive lens aperture. We also predict continued poorly coordinated sharing of this information, blunting its effectiveness (as with the 6,000+ different jurisdictions for 911 alerts).

11. Automation and systems investment

New technologies are continuing to emerge, and we predict a major funding uptick by the investment community (venture capital, private equity) in preventive and response capability solutions. You saw the almost-immediate repurposing of infrared sensing technologies to monitor for temperature screening and similar reapplications with video recognition systems. One robot technology could flash a warning to non-masked entrants using object recognition capabilities. Technology continues its relentless decrease in price and increase in capabilities!

12. Artificial intelligence

If you look at the literature and ads, you’d think everything in the security world is AI-powered; that machine learning is the norm for all corporations; and predictive intelligence is already globally deployed. While the trends are definitely heading these directions, we predict that it will take time before these are all standard issue. We also predict that long-term solutions will be built on AI Service Stacks from the major cloud providers, like Microsoft (Azure), Amazon (AWS) and Google (Cloud), much as high-level language compilers enabled a huge increase in software application development.  

13. Intelligent video

Cameras and video management are great, but require a human actively watching (one of the most boring jobs on Planet Earth), or they’re relegated to a forensic tool after incidents happen through a query of the Video Management System. A rapidly emerging set of intelligent video solutions will change the face of video surveillance (pun intended) by recognizing license plates, people, weapons, threatening interactions and much more. These systems can trigger structured alerts to a central situational awareness capability, allowing immediate and more proactive response by the security function.

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14. Drones and robots

We predict another watershed moment in security alerting as drones and robots de-crease in price, increase in capability, and combine with other emerging technologies such as connectivity, sensors and intelligent video. There may well be new collaborations between government, organizations, and watchdog organizations to enable privacy protection where possible. Note: Those drones and robots could become very invasive, especially as they shrink in size.

15. Supply chain

Many organizations were caught short when the worldwide lockdowns went into effect, losing vital suppliers and experiencing major delays on essential products like masks and disinfectant wipes. We’re predicting enhanced monitoring and situational awareness of vital supply chain elements, including the financial health of suppliers, and parallel disruptions such as extreme weather incidents. We also see multi-continent sourcing redundancy, as the worldwide recession drags on toward a recovery. 

16. 24x7 Operation Center creation and expansion

We’re seeing many more companies create a 24×7 monitoring and command center environment, and predict this will continue, particularly where a company’s assets and key relationships span the globe. The role of several of the security departments we work with has been broadening to incorporate additional 24×7 services; brand monitoring on social media is one example. The Security Operations Center could become the Services Operations Center as the need for rapid reaction and continual response increases.

17. Security vendors consolidation

We’ve seen multiple acquisitions (WorldAware, Stabilitas, Phoenix Systems) in just the last six months. It’s easy to predict that this will accelerate as more companies move to-ward broader, more integrated security solutions. Everbridge, the market leader, has an impressive market capitalization that has increased sharply, but that’s also made them a target to established competitors and disruptive startups.

18. Integrated security providers

Companies like Allied Universal have greatly augmented their manned security business with technology and high value risk/consulting services. This trend is likely to increase in the coming years as the complexity of blending many different vendors and contracts intensifies; we’ve had multiple companies express a desire for a single point of accountability who can manage and optimize the increasing number of equipment, data feeds, and integration efforts. 

The security function we see today will look quite different in five years. Make it happen, watch it happen, or end up wondering “what just happened?”

19. Innovation

We’re predicting more—an easy extrapolation based on the last 25 years and Moore’s law. It’s more exciting (and harder) to predict the combinent solutions that meld multiple emerging technologies and disrupt an industry with a new integrated solution. Uber is a great example. Building an efficient ride-sharing system pre-smartphone, pre-mobile payments and other technologies would have been very difficult 15 years ago. Iridium (satellite communications) and WebVan (online grocery) are examples of good ideas that launched too early, before the needed supportive technological infrastructure had been developed. 

We predict that intelligent video, AI, sensors, and mobility (drones and robots) will be combined into multiple disruptive capabilities in the next 36 months. Several futurists are on record saying we’ll have more change in the next 20 years than we’ve had in the last 100 years. The security function we see today will look quite different in five years. Make it happen, watch it happen, or end up wondering “what just happened?”

20. Interoperable data

Proprietary lock-in by vendors will be eroded by customers insisting on plug-and-play interfaces between systems. Google enabled great GIS interoperability with its global donation of KML. The Common Alerting Protocol (CAP) was developed by a consortium of emergency managers, guided by OASIS (itself a nonprofit consortium), to work across disparate systems and is freely available for use. We predict a greater use of interoperable data for device-enabled alerts and an increasing awareness by security strategists of the power of interoperability.

21. Surge services

Keeping extra headcount around for a high-impact, low-probability incident response team is going to be a tough sell to the C-suite, especially as budgets tighten. We see a continued trend toward contingency services – GSOC as a Service (GaaS), Analysts as a Service (AaaS), Intelligence as a Service (IaaS) as a means to ramp efforts in an emergency but keep fixed spending at a known level.

22. Information sharing

Due to the pandemic limiting water-cooler interaction and ad hoc meetings, companies have had to share more information electronically, and have reaped the benefits of digital, time-shifted communication. Cross-organizational information sharing has increased and we predict that the speed and cost burdens of staying current on a solo basis will encourage more information sharing alliances for non-proprietary data.

We hope you found these predictions insightful, and we welcome your feedback. Send us comments, augmentations, praise, quibbles, and pans. We’ve found non-proprietary information sharing to be a force multiplier, harnessing the wisdom of the crowds and saving immense amounts of time for all involved. Please contact us or tweet us at @SwanIslandNet.

This article was first published on the Disaster Recovery Journal website.

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]]> 10 Reasons You Need A Situational Awareness Program Now https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/10-reasons-situational-awareness?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=10-reasons-situational-awareness Thu, 01 Oct 2020 08:08:00 +0000 https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/?p=3975

10 Reasons You Need A Situational Awareness Program Now

urban crosswalk angle

1. Gain time for prevention and mitigation

Seconds and minutes can count in emergency situations. Active monitoring and a consolidated situational capability can give you a jump start on saving lives, property, and reputation. Prevention is always more cost-effective than recovery. And those critical seconds or minutes can mean all the difference.

2. Protect lives and property

Monitoring your organization 24×7 can give you additional information to prevent, mitigate, and recover from breaking situations.

3. Monitor your brand reputation

Become aware of what just happened on YouTube or Twitter concerning your primary product, or a disgruntled customer. Monitor your brand’s presence on a large global set of information services—news, social, and more.

4. Monitor your key competitors and suppliers

Did you know a competitor just acquired your critical supplier? Or that the latest typhoon in the Pacific is going to delay critical shipments from another key supplier?

5. Communication paths

Continual monitoring will identify the right people to be notified under many different circumstances—internal, partners, customers, regulators, and others. 

TX360 provides situational awareness for every need.
The TX360 dashboard.

6. Increase organizational continuity

When your security or response team can monitor and respond to emerging threat situations with practiced expertise, the bulk of your organization can remain on target, versus dealing with distractions and disruptions.

7. Consolidate internal, redundant, fragmented efforts

The reality is, people throughout your organization searching every day for different threat and news items that concern them, but not sharing effectively. This results in huge hidden costs that could be better spent elsewhere.

8. Continual practice

Monitoring 24×7 helps you and your people remain familiar with your tools and sets up a warm start on an incident. You can build exercises into your daily process so when the real emergencies happen, your team responds like a well-oiled machine.

9. Leverage new information sources

There are new and emerging information sources that could give you increased situational awareness—not just news, but sensor alerts, intelligent video alerts, and much more.

10. Black Swans

If a major incident strikes, the same tools you used for proactive situation awareness can be redirected to the immediate, no-notice situation: gathering information from multiple sources, enhancing organizational communications, and sharing with other involved parties.

11. Surge partners (bonus)

For most of us, staffing 24×7 for any emergency that might happen is not cost effective. Having a strong monitoring program can give you the time to get secondary players and outside partners involved and underway, helping you resolve critical issues.

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]]> Enterprise Risk Management: 3 Keys to Success https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/enterprise-risk-management-3-keys?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=enterprise-risk-management-3-keys Tue, 08 Sep 2020 10:33:00 +0000 https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/?p=8508

Enterprise Risk Management: 3 Keys to Success

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If you don't have an umbrella, why check the weather?

Enterprise Risk Management can be very complicated. If you are a multi-national with global supply chains and a threat matrix that includes physical, cyber, competitive, brand, disruption, and high-impact, low-probability events (like COVID19), then you have a lot to think about. Add in the risk elements of the global economic recovery, and it’s easy to become swamped.

Complexity is the Enemy of Enterprise Risk Management

Complexity and overload are the enemies of Enterprise Risk Management. Simple things can make a big difference during a crisis. Being ready is a combination of situational awareness and resources. The right resources help you prevent situations that put your organization at risk. 

Consider this: 100 years ago, getting proactive information was fraught with problems. For example, Galveston was virtually destroyed by a hurricane they didn’t see coming. Today, we’re swimming in information. It can overwhelm us and cause us to miss things in the river of news, alerts, warnings, emails, texts, sensors and more.

3 Keys to Enterprise Risk Management

Enterprise Risk Management can be complicated. But it doesn’t have to be. Here are 3 keys to success.

Key #1: Set Risk Level

Does your company have a well-developed, tactical risk identification and response capability? If not, there are many services and tools available to help you once you understand what you need. Key to assembling the right arsenal of capabilities is the Board and C-Suite setting the overall risk appetite, approving the threat matrix, and allocating the resources needed to monitor and respond when called upon.

Proper enterprise risk management can help reduce risk to your organization.

Key #2: Acquire Contingency Resources

Another key is finding contingency resources that can be mobilized to augment your dedicated personnel. These can be a combination of internal and external personnel and flexible services that can be scaled when needed.

Key #3: Be Flexible

Key to your technology selection is flexibility. Are you going to face a 3-year unbreakable contract? Or a flexible capability that can react to your budget? Do you use the tool continuously, so an emergency is just a bump? Or is it a scramble to remember the passwords and how to use the product? (In other words, “break glass in case of emergency.”) Can you interact with outside stakeholders? For example, customers, suppliers, and regional and industry sharing partners?

The threat picture is getting more complex by the day! When you see it’s going to rain, make sure your umbrella is close at hand.

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]]> 5 Ways to Improve Your Economic Recovery Results Quickly https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/5-ways-improve-economic-recovery-results?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=5-ways-improve-economic-recovery-results Fri, 01 May 2020 00:01:24 +0000 https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/?p=6904

5 Ways to Improve Your Economic Recovery Results Quickly

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As the global pandemic caused by COVID-19 (coronavirus) becomes more controllable, we face a unique problem. 

How to start the discretionary economy back up?

Economic recovery is complex

Restarting the economy entails consumer activities like church, sporting events, and trips to the beach. We expect to see all these things this summer and fall.

For industries that rely on social interaction, the business implications are serious. Tourism, retail, and entertainment are a few of the industries most affected by the lockdown. International business travel has all but stopped. Global consulting firms are confronting an industry-wide contraction even while they adapt to meet shifting client needs. That is to say, the number of different factors involved in the economic recovery will be large.

So, here are five ways you can prepare your teams for the economic recovery. Realize there may be external factors that suddenly cause you to retreat (recurrence), rethink (new legal liabilities), or reorganize (someone’s found a better way).

1. Organize a corporate nerve center

Put together the corporate never center described in the recent McKenzie article Decision Making in Uncertain Times. Unify your efforts. Have a 24/7 schedule with rotating resources. Get strategic direction from the C-Suite and set up a recurring briefing with the board of director. Share all relevant issues and information with the cross-company effort.

2. Monitor trusted sources for situational intelligence

A unified monitoring effort will save you time. And it’s more effective than random browsing. So, stay aware of best practices. Know the laws and regulations. Follow changes to industry policies. Track virus recurrences and changes to your supply chain. Follow external sources that impact your organization, like open-source intelligence (OSINT), social media, and government alerts. The rate of change to your business will be very high. And missing key elements may slow your entire recovery effort.

A woman wearing a blue face mask gazes at you unsmiling during the economic recovery.

3. Share and collaborate

Sharing best practices with your peer group will serve you well long after the recovery. Realize that companies like yours are dealing with almost identical issues. Similarly, companies in your geographic region are also dealing with parallel problems. Don’t worry, there are many ways to share without revealing proprietary information. 

4. Everyone, keep watch

Establish a “see something/say something” process. Empower your teams to report issues via phone, text, and email. Whatever it takes. Have a rapid response capability set up to take advantage of the information bullets you receive.

5. Get real-time feedback

Contingency planning will be key to getting knocked down, getting up, and trying another way to get on track. Expect there to be confusion and failures along the way, and instill a sense of urgency to solve the issues. 

Follow these steps and you will be more able to craft an effective response plan and execute it quickly. It’s important to your organization and very important to the world at large.

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]]> Interoperability Lessons For Right Now https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/interoperability-lessons-for-right-now?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=interoperability-lessons-for-right-now Fri, 10 Apr 2020 12:13:00 +0000 https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/?p=9225

Interoperability Lessons For Right Now

Interoperability lessons help response times during a pandemic

Remember when your new phone had a unique charger that wouldn’t work with other phones, and leaving it behind caused a major nightmare? Sanity prevailed, and except for Apple, the whole world now uses USB to plug virtually everything in. Our WWW and Internet came about because of a few standards that took hold internationally and took root before different groups could craft their own conflicting way of doing things.

There is a lesson here for the pandemic and especially for the recovery efforts that are going to take place – a uniform way, wherever possible, will allow for a much more rapid path back to whatever new normal emerges.

There are only 50 states, so why worry? Because according to Wikipedia, as of 2016, there were 3,007 counties, 64 parishes, 19 organized boroughs, 10 census areas, 41 independent cities, and the District of Columbia for a total of 3,142 counties and county-equivalents in the 50 states and District of Columbia. And there is the rest of the world beyond our shores.

Imagine everyone going their own way on the 1,000 different issues we’re going to confront soon (when rational decisions are made to restart) – opening schools, testing food workers, getting on an international flight, going to your own sport’s 50,000 plus stadium for a game (that seems so 6 months ago!).

How do you get beyond this problem? Information sharing, planning and coordination can go a long way. Communications need to gross all the FSLTIPP boundaries (a long forgetting post 9/11 acronym – Federal, State, Local, Tribal, International, public, and private).

Get started now on the recovery and post-recovery and we’ll reap some huge gains. Saving one month of the world economy translates to at least a bundle of billions.

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]]> Why timely information sharing can help your recovery now! https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/information-sharing-can-help-recovery?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=information-sharing-can-help-recovery Sun, 05 Apr 2020 02:00:32 +0000 https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/?p=7421

Why timely information sharing can help your recovery now!

  • April 5, 2020
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Restarting the world economy after the COVID-19 crisis is going to be hard. We’ve never turned the world off like this before. (And kudos to every worker in health care, power, public safety, security, trucking, and everyone else who can’t work from home. We’re all relying on you!)

Connect The Dots With Information Sharing

An almost-forgotten lesson from 9/11 is the need to share information (connect the dots). And the world is still bad at it. It seems we can’t define what a COVID-19 death is. So, even the numbers we’re likely all watching are in question. If everyone goes a different way during the economic restart, two things will happen. First, we will add months to the timeline. And second, we will collectively waste billions of pick-your-favorite-currency. A little sharing and coordination up front might help everyone.

"The key to a successful restart is communicating and sharing all the best ideas and information ahead of time."

Example: The Food Industry

We’re all going to face challenges getting back to the ‘normal’ we took for granted a couple of months ago. One example shared with me was whether food workers should be required to test virus-free before returning to work. Sounds relatively benign until you think about the number of government and private sector decision makers who would have to deal with this. 

For example, if you have 2,000 restaurants in 17 countries, it’s likely going to be a very complicated period. Repeat that scenario with 10,000 other problems, and you start to get a sense of the complexity. Disclaimer: I know nothing about the restaurant industry except for two very impactful years working for McDonald’s in the ‘70s. But I’m not going back into anyone’s restaurant as a consumer until this gets figured out.

Example: NYC Metropolitan Resilience Network

The NYC Metropolitan Resilience Network (MRN) started with information sharing in mind. One of its action items after Superstorm Sandy was to easily share situational awareness information across the network. Today, over 400 organizations in the MRN use the automated situational awareness dashboards. Analysts can augment the dashboards in the event of a crisis. 

confident woman in black drinking coffee after information sharing with business partners

Start Collaborating Now

Information sharing on a broad scale now can help sort out some of these issues later. Industries can collaborate with each other. Governments at the local, regional, and national levels can coordinate. There can be communication between all parties. Information sharing can prevent random decisions that result from a lack of planning. 

You don’t have to do all the work. There are many people out there that will have kick-ass solutions to many of the problems we’re going to face. The key is communicating and sharing all the best ideas and information ahead of time. You don’t have to share your proprietary data. You can track other’s efforts, and gain some time while saving some money. It could mean a lot to the world at large.

This is something you can do from the couch, home office, or wherever you are sheltering in place. Imagine if everyone helped solve one small issue. We could impact the economic restart the way Wikipedia has impacted historical knowledge.

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]]> How To Prepare For A Strong Recovery From COVID-19 https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/how-to-prepare-recovery-from-covid-19?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=how-to-prepare-recovery-from-covid-19 Sun, 29 Mar 2020 00:29:39 +0000 https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/?p=7349

How To Prepare For A Strong Recovery From COVID-19

The world is in free fall and people are confused.

The Covid-19 pandemic has caused many to speculate when the infection will peak. And when the world can begin to recover from this major event.

Early predictions of a pandemic were ignored, but things will recover, and you need to be ready.

How To Prepare For A Strong Recovery From COVID-19

Start preparing now for a strong recovery from COVID-19 while the majority of your critical assets (your people) are at home. Likely you were caught short on the pandemic. Don’t make the same mistake on the recovery. Your business depends on it.

The recovery is going to affect every business differently. A small-town bed and breakfast will re-enter the commercial economy much differently than a multi-national financial institution. But, many of the underlying thought processes are the same.

Here’s how to prepare for a strong recovery from COVID-19.

Intelligence Filtering

The news has great insights. But, you need to filter the information. Find the areas that are relevant to your specific issues and problems. Then, analyze them. After that, share selectively and on a targeted basis across your organization.

Situational Awareness

You need to maintain full situational awareness. It’s likely to be a rapidly-changing landscape. For example, you may plan to reopen a factory in Washington State as cases ebb only to have a flareup in a nearby town.

Information Sharing

You can’t do it all alone, and you shouldn’t want to. You need to work with customers and suppliers in a tightly coordinated fashion. But, regional organizations, critical infrastructure providers, and government agencies are also critical.

business team plans economic Recovery From COVID-19

Systematic Response

Take a disciplined approach toward preparedness. You likely have the time now to do a great planning job. Get the tools and processes you need set up and integrated into your organization while its still raining outside.

Preparedness always takes a back seat to other activities except in the most thoughtful of organizations. While there is little to no activity, it’s a great time to get organized for the recovery cycle. I hope these fundamentals help you prepare for a strong recovery from COVID-19 and also lay the groundwork for responding to your next emergency situation. (You know its coming!)

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]]> When the Ship Goes Down, You Need a Lifeboat https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/backup-systems-when-ship-goes-down?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=backup-systems-when-ship-goes-down Wed, 08 Nov 2017 20:24:00 +0000 https://www.swanislandnetworks.com/?p=9167

When the Ship Goes Down, You Need a Lifeboat

backup systems guard against disasters

You’ve undoubtedly read about or experienced the Delta outage this week; you might be sitting in an airport reading this right now!

Corporations are not putting the kind of thought, effort and money into backup systems to help when these kind of events transpire. Black swans do land in everyone’s lake at some point.

Having a cloud based system that is completely disconnected from your legacy systems is one small thing you can do. Communications, information sharing, data collection, and situational awareness updates can all be accomplished for with systems like TX360 from Swan Island Networks. There are many other easy to implement tools that can help your organization cope; having critical people create a non-company email account is another simple example, and having a paper based list of critical phone numbers in the event you actually have to dial the phone.

It starts with the commitment to resilience – how am I going to keep my organization through the shocks that can show up from Mother Nature as well as manmade events? The CEO and Board have to lead, and have to fund real versus BS efforts. The company has to exercise, including with vital partners, ahead of time to insure everyone knows the drill, and how to take the place of someone not around.

You should also be insistent with your critical suppliers that the same approach is followed. We all have to consider the consequences.

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