Speaker biographies

Bob Ayers
Bob Ayers is now an Associate Fellow of Chatham House (Information Security Programme), following a 29-year career with the US DoD. His principal IT security related assignment was with the Defense Intelligence Agency where he served as the Chief of the DoD Intelligence Information System (DoDIIS) Computer Security Program.

During this assignment Bob developed and implemented new methodologies to insure the security of over 40,000 computers processing highly classified intelligence information. Bob also founded the DoD CERT also known as the Automate Systems Security Incident Support Team or ASSIST while at the DIA Noticed for his work in DoDIIS information systems security, the US Assistant Secretary of Defence for Command & Control Communications, Intelligence selected Bob to create and manage a 155 person, $100M/Yr DoD-wide program to make systemic improvements to all aspects of DoD IT Security to include; Security Policy, Penetration Testing, Incident Response, Certification and Accreditation, Training & Education, Architecture & Engineering, and Multi-Level Security. Bob has also served as the Chief of the DoD Defensive Information Warfare Program Management Office where he managed a program to protect DoD Computers from hostile attack

Simon Briskman
Simon is a transactional and advisory lawyer specialising in outsourcing and information and communications technology. He has considerable commercial experience as an in-house lawyer, having spent three years with Fujitsu Services. He serves a range of sectors including technology, telecoms, financial services, property and retail on complex and innovative deals. His clients range from start-ups and venture capital backed companies to some of the world's largest international corporations.
His outsourcing experience includes trading and funds management systems; property, facilities management, warehousing and logistics; payroll and accounting and a range of technology and business process outsourcing transactions.

Simon regularly advises on legal aspects of business continuity in the context of technology and outsourcing, including continuity of service, data integrity and insurance issues. Much of his experience spans international aspects.

Simon regularly contributes to journals and speaks at seminars on current outsourcing, technology, information security, data privacy and governance issues affecting senior management and their organisations. He is a member of the National Outsourcing Association.

Ian Charters
Ian Charters developed an interest in the impacts of natural disasters whilst reading Geography at Durham University. He worked for fifteen years in the computer industry initially for an engineering company then an IT facilities management company which offered a DR service. In 1995 he established his own business continuity consultancy, Continuity Systems Limited. He combines his training role with continuity projects for clients which have included major corporates in the insurance, manufacturing, transport and logistics sectors. Public sector clients include a national parliament, local and regional authorities, emergency services and charities.
Ian was elected a Member of the Business Continuity Institute in 1997, was elected to the BCI Board in 2001 and became a Fellow in 2004 and is currently Chair of the BCI Education Committee. He led the team developing the BCI's Good Practice Guidelines (2005) and has also contributed to the Civil Contingencies Bill Guidance and the new British Standard.

In addition to in-house tuition Ian presents a number of public courses. Most courses are run in London but recent locations have included Toronto, Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Riyadh, Singapore, Karachi and Hong Kong. He also presents a module of the Business Continuity Diploma course at Coventry University.

Richard Dean
After a successful career in the City of London with British Telecom, Richard was invited to join the University of Arizona’s Health Science Centre as a group trainer/facilitator, working on a contract with the United States Department of Defence. For three years he worked with members of the U.S. Navy and Civil Service, developing people’s inter-personal and self-management skills. He also worked on University projects designed to tackle drug and alcohol issues.
In 1994 Richard turned his attention to the world of business, forging links with many international organisations to which he has become a valued resource. His work currently takes him into corporations who specialise in the fields of telecommunications, pharmaceuticals, data processing and banking. Richard has also been working with the UK Police Service and the Home office, and has delivered trainings over in Europe and as far a field as America and Australia.

Sir Merlin Erroll
Sir Merlin Sereld Victor Gilbert Hay Moncreiffe, 24th Earl of Erroll, 25th Lord Hay, 24th Lord Slains, 12th Bt of Moncreiffe of that Ilk, 28th Hereditary Lord High Constable of Scotland, 32nd Chief of The Hays was appointed president of the E-business Regulatory Alliance in November 2003. He was educated at Eton College and at Trinity College, Cambridge.

Merlin has a background in computer programming, and remains a Parliamentary cross bench peer with a specific interest in ICT and e-business issues. He is a council member of PITCOM - the Parliamentary Information Technology Committee, and is secretary of APIG - the All Party Internet Group. Merlin is also a member of the policy advisory board of Nominet. He has been actively involved in the House of Lords' work on ID cards, data sharing and access to communications data and is also a council member of the European Information Group and has his own company specializing in e-procurement.

Chris Green
Chris Green MSc FBCI ANZIIF(Fellow) has been involved in business continuity for more than a decade. Currently head of business continuity for the HBOS Group, Chris is responsible for strategy and oversight of the business continuity programs in the bank’s varied businesses. HBOS has one of the most wide-ranging and successful BC programs in the industry, which is measured with innovative benchmarking and KRI tools. Chris is vice-chair of the Business Continuity Institute, and chair of the technical committee developing the British Standard for BCM, BS-25999.

Tim Hutchings
Tim Hutchings is the chief executive of The Hertfordshire Chamber of Commerce & Industry and a director of Business Link Hertfordshire. Prior to taking up his present post in 1994 Tim was involved in the security industry specialising in intellectual property protection. Since Tim took charge the Hertfordshire Chamber of Commerce & Industry has increased its business activity fourfold and is now regarded as one of the country’s leading Chambers of Commerce providing business support for a wide range of companies. HCCI has a long history of supporting international trade and Tim has been instrumental in developing this still further, he has been particularly active in his role as a member of the East of England Regional Assembly in developing links between Eastern Europe and China. Tim’s other roles include being chairman of The Hertfordshire Adult Learning Partnership, chairman of the county’s Aimhigher Work Based Learning Group and Deputy Chairman of Hertfordshire Young Enterprise and a member of the Herts B2E Steering Group; He also served as the British Chambers of Commerce nominee on the ‘Tomlinson’ employers contact sub-group of the Governments 14-19 working group and as a Director of Groundwork Hertfordshire and Hertfordshire Prosperity.

Tim is married and lives with his wife and family in Hoddesdon. He has two sons and a daughter. His interests include most sports, reading and travel, he has recently qualified as a UK Athletics Coach.

Paul Jacob
Paul Jacob has been providing risk management consulting to clients in the financial services sector and public sector for over twelve years. He is currently a principal consultant with Atos Consulting where he specialises in IT disaster recovery, business continuity planning, operational resilience, operational risk management , and IT outsourcing. He has over 10 years disaster recovery and service continuity experience as well as in-depth business and IT consulting and project management experience. Before joining Atos Consulting's Business Risk Management Practice in 2005, Paul spent three years with IBM in their Business Continuity and Risk Services Practice and ten years with PwC in their Global Risk Management Solutions practice. Prior to consulting Paul spent over 10 years within the IT department of a multinational manufacturing organisation as a technical support manager on IBM mainframe, midrange systems and network support.

Andy Jones
Andy Jones CISSP is a senior research consultant with the Information Security Forum (ISF), an independent, not-for-profit association of over 270 of the worlds’ leading organisations. Andy joined the Information Security Forum in 2004, bringing a solid industry background within information security. He has over twenty years experience within the IT industry working in a number of roles ranging from programming to technical strategy for blue chip companies. Prior to joining ISF, Andy was a security manager for a large international airline for many years before moving to become head of information security at a major UK retailer. Andy has specialist knowledge in the areas of outsourcing and disaster recovery, having worked extensively in these fields.

Projects undertaken for the ISF to date have included the 2005 update to the ISF Standard of Good Practice for Information Security, ‘Sarbanes-Oxley – Implications for Information Security’ and ‘Security and Legislation: Complying with information security-related legislation.’ Andy is currently working on a project investigating issues related to document retention.

Andy holds a CISSP qualification, an MBA from Lancaster University and a BSc from Southampton University. He is also an associate member of the American Bar Association.

Prof Trevor M Jones
Prof Trevor M Jones CBE PhD Hon DSc FKC FRSC FPS Hon FRCP FFPM FBPharmacolS is a director of Allergan Inc (USA) and Senior R&D Advisor to Esteve SA(Spain) and Servier (France).He is also deputy chairman of council, visiting professor at King’s College, London, chairman of the UK stem cell biotech company ReNeuron Ltd , the Dutch Biotech ligand company BAC. BV, the European company People in Health and a member of the Board of NextPharma Technologies Ltd.
From 1987-94, he was a main board director of The Wellcome Foundation, where he was responsible for R&D including the development of AZT, Zovirax, Malarone and other medicines. He is a founder member of the Geneva-based, Public: Private Partnership, Medicines for Malaria Venture (MMV) and in 2004 was appointed to the World Health Organisation (WHO) Commission on Intellectual Property Rights, Innovation and Public Health (CIPIH).He was for 12 years a member of The UK Government regulatory agency, The Medicines Commission. For 10 years until September 2004 he was director general of the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI). In 2005 he was the winner of the SCRIP Life Time Achievement award for his contribution to the pharmaceutical sciences and industry.
He was honoured by Her Majesty the Queen by the award of CBE in the 2003 New Year's Honours List.

Avinash Kadam
Kadam will provide insight on the trends in developing countries – since he has been an ISC2 trainer, a SANS GSEC mentor, as well as a DNV accredited BS7799 Lead Auditor Trainer and is the ex-president of ISACA’s Indian chapter. He interacts with certification candidates and would-be candidates on a regular basis, and has provided training to over 300 CISAs and CISMs. He has worked on consulting assignments for several large Indian software development companies, mostly providing guidance for designing and implementing a formal policy based security management system for Global 2000 companies that demand that their outsourcing provider fall in line with their own security practices. Kadam is the recipient of the 2005 Harold Weiss Award for dedication to Security, Audit, and Training Profession.

Chris Needham-Bennett
Chris is the MD of Needhams 1834, Risk Management Services Ltd. Since 1996, Needhams’ consultants have developed corporate risk management services for banks, HM Government Ministries, airlines, legal firms and manufacturing industries. The company specialises in the development of risk and crisis training, all aspects of business continuity, including database development and DR solutions.
Chris specialises in crisis management planning, and control room rehearsals. His company is currently developing plans and conducting crisis management centre training and rehearsals for defence industries, bank, and the public health sector.

Mr Lembit Öpik MP
Lembit Öpik read Philosophy at Bristol University, where he was president of the Student Union and an NUS National Executive Member. In 1988 he joined Procter and Gamble where he became corporate training and organisation development manager. In 1997, he was elected as MP for Montgomeryshire and was re-elected in 2001 and 2005. He is the Liberal Democrat Spokesperson for Northern Ireland and Wales, and in 2001 he became the Leader of the Welsh Liberal Democrats. Lembit is a keen pilot, and his other interests include astronomy, motorbikes, folk music and stand up comedy. Lembit speaks fluent Estonian and is learning Welsh.

Michael J. Pearce
A professionally qualified and extensively trained police officer in physical security, sabotage and counter terrorism issues. Currently delivering complex strategic business continuity and risk management services to the diplomatic community in London. An individual who is continually working in partnership with the Government Cabinet Office, Home Office, Foreign Office, Embassies and Security Services in London. Previously having worked at the Ministry of Defence and Wilmott Dixon UK delivering security, project management and construction/ building services.He has a range of qualifications that include National firearms tactical advisor, project management, business continuity, crisis management, Health and Safety, Home Office Security/Crime Prevention and CCTV and security audits. He is a member of the Business Continuity Institute. Michael is currently serving in the Metropolitan Police Diplomatic Protection Group.

Peter Power
Peter Power BA FCMI FEPS FIRM FBCI is managing director of Visor Consultants located in the centre of London. He regularly helps organisations to plan and deliver highly successful scenario based exercises as well as workshops, leadership courses and motivation sessions. He often appears on BBC & ITN News and has considerable front-line experience of many real crises. His research on crisis decision making is quoted in the UK Government (Cabinet Office) Guide on Integrated Emergency Management and he is the author of many other advice guidebooks, including the original UK Govt. (DTI) booklet 'Preventing Chaos in a Crisis'. He is a Special Advisor to a number of key organisations including the Canadian Centre for Emergency Preparedness and the BCI London Forum. He is in addition, a Special Advisor to the editorial board of Continuity Professional Magazine in the USA and is listed in the UK as an Expert Witness.

Mike Osborne
Mike Osborne is managing director – business continuity for ICM’s Recovery Services division. He started off in IT as a sales executive 18 years ago and has since worked his way up in the industry. Mike joined ICM in 1992 as a result of a business acquisition and was appointed operations director. In 1998 he formed part of the management team of ICM, which took the business to a full stock market listing and plc status. Mike has been a driving force in the development of ICM’s thriving Business Continuity Division.

John Robinson
John Robinson FBCI MSc is managing director of JRCPL and a Fellow of the Business Continuity Institute. He is known in the industry as the creator of INONI, the ground-breaking online diagnostic tool currently used by the UK authorities to benchmark the financial sector’s resilience and recovery capability. Previously, John built, led and operated successful risk management consultancies at Safetynet plc and Adam Associates (later Global Continuity and NeverFail Group plc) over a 12-year period. In this time he devised and delivered many innovative risk management and business continuity techniques that are still in use today. With success founded on an MSc. in Control Electronics and an early career in technology and innovation for ITT, ICL, STC and PA Consulting Group, John has gone on to deliver practical continuity-related consultancy across four continents and to most sectors of industry. He is a frequent public speaker and has chaired a number of industry conferences.

Ruth Shearn
Ruth Shearn is managing director of Cheshire-based RMS PR. Ruth's clients come from across the UK and include legal and accountancy firms, building societies, financial institutions, manufacturers, engineering and architectural practices. Most of the time she focuses on raising the media profile of these clients but occasionally she is called upon to minimize media coverage and protect her clients' reputation in the face of a crisis. A direct, jargon-free and pragmatic approach to press relations has gained Ruth the respect of both clients and journalists alike.

Stephen Stobo
Stephen Stobo is sales director for the NeverFail Group. Stephen joined the company in 2001 bringing over 19 years of experience in both channel and direct sales. Serving as sales director for Rest of World (ROW), he is responsible for identifying, targeting, recruiting and developing strong channel partnerships in the UK and Ireland, and more recently throughout the EMEA and Asia Pacific regions.

With an expert knowledge of the reseller and distributor network, Stephen was influential in Neverfail’s transition from a direct to a channel sales strategy. During this transition, Neverfail continued to increase revenue and maintain positive growth. With Stephen’s leadership, the ROW team has signed over 100 partners and 7 distributors to date.

Stephen also served as Neverfail’s sales and marketing director in EMEA and Asia Pacific and was responsible for many of the ebusiness initiatives which have increased and strengthened Neverfail’s channel partner efficiency, including the ‘Neverfail Fast Start’ program for newly recruited partners, as well as targeting and recruiting distribution partners in 12 countries. Stephen also designed and developed ‘Campaigns-in-a-Box’, which unifies and simplifies all joint partner marketing campaigns. A series of ‘Connected’ marketing campaigns have generated over 6,000 leads to date.

Prior to Neverfail, from 2000 to 2001, Stephen was the UK channel manager for Epicor Software Corporation, the largest mid-market supplier of ebusiness solutions. At Epicor, Stephen managed existing partners and developed new vertical sectors for his existing channel partners. He was also responsible for recruiting new vertically focused channel partners.

Mick Williams
Mick Williams is sales director – business continuity for ICM’s Recovery Services division. Mick joined ICM in 2003 and has spearheaded ICM’s innovative inner and outer London strategy and built ICM’s profile as a major provider to the financial services community. Mick Williams is a well respected and highly motivated business continuity professional with more than 20 years experience of working in the development and implementation of innovative business continuity solutions around the globe.

Ruth Williams
Ruth Williams, MBCI, manages the Office-Shadow Implementation Services team. She previously worked as a business continuity consultant for SunGard Availability Services. She then joined Swiss Re as their UK business continuity manager throughout the move into 30 St Mary Axe - London’s iconic ‘Gherkin’. Ruth progressed on to Citigroup where she was responsible for the business continuity planning for the technology division across EMEA. Ruth was short listed for Business Continuity Manager of the Year in 2004. Ruth has a Master of Business Administration from Henley Management College and specialised in Business Continuity Performance Metrics.