Author Archives: Justin Smulison

About Justin Smulison

Justin Smulison is the business content manager at RIMS and the host of RIMScast, the society's weekly podcast.
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Deadly Ferguson Wildfires Threaten Access to Yosemite Park

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The Ferguson wildfires have been spreading in Mariposa County, California on the western edge of Yosemite National Park for days, burning 27 square miles and taking the life of one firefighter.

The Mercury News reported that more than 1,400 firefighters have been on the scene trying to protect 100 nearby homes and businesses that are in the fire’s path as it moves south and east.

The fires began July 13 at about 8:30 p.m. and by July 15 had nearly doubled to 9,300 acres. On Wednesday it was at 17,319 acres and 5% contained. And while authorities have not declared an official cause, Colin Gannon, senior data analyst at Four Twenty Seven, which studies the economic risk of climate change, said weather and environmental conditions are certainly contributing factors.

“In [this case], three factors—persistent wind, low humidity, and high availability of fuel sources—aligned just right for rapid fire growth. Weather conditions in the days leading up to the fire were extremely hot and dry, with temperatures approaching 100°F, and strong winds pushed the fire into the hills and valleys, allowing the it to spread quickly,” Gannon said. “Compounding this issue is the widespread presence of dry needles and dead trees, which are a highly combustible fuel source. To make matters worse, the location of the fire in steep and rugged terrain has made access difficult for those fighting the fire.”

On July 15, Pacific Gas & Electric Co. switched off power lines serving the area, affecting parts of Yosemite, El Portal and Foresta, in an effort to mitigate further fire risk.

The severity of the fires has not closed down Yosemite, which is nearly 1,200 square miles wide, but did force the closure of several miles of Highway 140 in Mariposa County west of El Portal, limiting some access to the park. The park’s website also advises visitors to “expect poor air quality and limited visibility due to the Ferguson Fire. Smoke may be heavy at times, and visitors should be prepared to limit any heavy outdoor activity during the periods of poor air quality.”

Weather is expected to remain hot and dry for the next seven days, with isolated thunderstorms possible over the Sierra Crest, which authorities are hoping could provide some relief.

According to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, 3,213 fires burned 98,169 acres in the state between January 1 and July 15 of this year. That acreage is down more than 30,000 from this time last year. By September 2017, the Forest Service and Interior Department had spent more than $2 billion fighting fires in the United States for the year — making it the most expensive wildfire season on record.

The insurance industry has been reacting to the high activity, Gannon said, particularly regarding residential properties in risky areas.

“There have been incidents of private insurers dropping coverage for homeowners in high fire risk areas,” Gannon said. “It is difficult to say how pervasively this will occur when new science, and subsequently new understanding of fire risk, becomes available. As a result, state insurance, otherwise known as the California FAIR plan is stepping in to provide coverage for high risk areas.”

As Risk Management Monitor reported, the Insurance Institute for Business and Home Safety (IIBHS) recommends that organizations survey the materials and design features of their structures; as well as the types of plants used, their location and maintenance.

Companies also should determine their fire hazard severity zone (FHSZ) by evaluating the landscape, fire history in the area and terrain features such as slope of the land. Organizations can request the FHSZ rating from local building or fire officials in their area.

IIBHS notes three sources of wildfire ignition:

  1. Burning embers, or firebrands, generated by a wildfire and made worse in windy conditions.
  2. Direct flame contact from the wildfire.
  3. Radiant heat emanating from the fire.

Resiliency in 2018: Q&A With BCI’s David Thorp

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Organizational resiliency is a focus of the Business Continuity Institute (BCI) and executive director David Thorp. It was the theme of this year’s annual Business Continuity Awareness Week, which Risk Management Monitor covered in May, and was the focus of BCI’s updated manifesto.

We reached out to Thorp to get his insight on organizational resiliency, how businesses can improve their continuity plans and for ways to better incorporate them into their culture.

Risk Management Monitor: What companies have best demonstrated resilience?

David Thorp: A few examples of organizations that have displayed a high level of resilience are Apple, TomTom, and PostNL.

Apple displayed resilience when they reemployed Steve Jobs to reshape the company.

TomTom started by making software for Palm computers. It has dealt with a rapidly changing marketplace and over the years it has:

  • produced navigation software for PDAs (personal digital assistant)
  • produced its own navigation devices
  • developed live traffic information
  • acquired a digital mapping company
  • developed navigation software for smartphones
  • struck up deals with car manufacturers

PostNL (formerly TNT) has had to adapt to the decline in regular mail as well as tapping into the requirement to deliver more packages (outside working hours) as a result of an increase of web shops.

RMM:  What do organizations most commonly overlook in their continuity planning?

DT: Two most commonly overlooked aspects are keeping plans up to date and exercising/testing.

Business continuity management is often initiated as a project, usually assisted with external expertise. Internal personnel frequently have this role in addition to their “normal” functions. As the organization changes, these plans often get overlooked. After one or two exercises have been carried out, the focus on exercising quickly diminishes.

Unfortunately, these two aspects have a large impact on the ability to recover as planned. It could be argued that this is an indication of a lack of management commitment.

RMM: Why do so many companies overlook their continuity planning and emergency preparedness?

DT: The biggest reason is that it is not a requirement for many organizations. When not required by a regulator or a customer, the organization must:

  1. know about continuity planning and emergency preparedness
  2. understand their risk
  3. understand its value before there is a possibility of it being implemented

By not having done a risk or impact analysis, it is also easy for organizations to think that a disruptive event will not happen to them and therefore not worth the hassle and investment.

RMM: How much time and effort does creating and initiating a business continuity plan take?

DT: This depends on the size and complexity of the organization, the ambition level and the resources available. For small organizations, it is possible to create and exercise plans within a month—but this would typically take a little longer as the required people will also have other tasks. For a large and more complex organization, it may take two-to-three years to reach the desired maturity level.

RMM: What advances would you like to see the global risk management community achieve with regard to planning and preparedness?

DT: I would like to see a better understanding of each other’s disciplines and a better collaboration between them. There is much overlap between the two disciplines and with better collaboration, we can more efficiently and effectively minimize risks and improve the continuity. We are currently working on better understanding how we achieve synergy between business continuity and risk management. We see this as being a prerequisite for achieving organizational resilience. Collaboration with other disciplines is also necessary.

RMM: We’ve seen examples of reputation crises that have in some cases forced companies to close. How can organizations avoid these pitfalls?

DT: A major factor in managing the extent of the reputation damage is the quality of the crisis communication. How well and honestly you inform those affected and of course how you deal with social media makes the difference in how you are perceived. The subsequent actions need to be in line with the messages communicated.

RMM: What has changed in the BCI’s Manifesto for Organizational Resilience that risk professionals should know about?

DT: The manifesto is built on the simple premise that resilience is not the responsibility of one part of the organization—it is the responsibility of discipline within an organization working closely together toward a common purpose. Risk Management, emergency planning, disaster recovery, security, facilities management, business continuity management, supply chain management, IT management, HR management…all have an equal role to play in delivering resilience.

The manifesto contains our undertaking to seek out alliances with other professional bodies along the spectrum of what might be termed “resilience disciplines” in order to work collaboratively. This would make organizations more resilient than if we each work within our own silo.

Starbucks And Coffee Industry To Reassess Strategies

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The coffee industry is poised for moderate growth in the next five years, but is warned of an emerging risk: an informed consumer, according to a recent IBISWorld report.

“Despite long-term, aggregate declines in healthy eating, consumers are more aware of health issues associated with fatty foods and are increasingly going out of their way to avoid them,” its latest Coffee & Snack Shops industry report notes. Consumers who are more aware of the nutritional information of a Starbucks Frappuccino, for example, may be less inclined to make repeat purchases. “The healthy eating index is expected to stagnate [in] 2018, but as consumers’ diets progressively improve, this driver continues to pose a threat to industry operators,” IBISWorld said.

Last week, in Starbucks’ financial release, President and CEO Kevin Johnson acknowledged his clientele’s evolving tastes. “We must move faster to address the more rapidly changing preferences and needs of our customers,” he said.

And so, with the Seattle-headquartered roaster and retailer leading the charge, the industry is expected to get creative and a bit more versatile. In its five-year forecast, IBISWorld suggests that coffee alone can no longer fuel the industry’s expansion, which is expected to stay resilient at an annualized rate of 0.9% to $51 billion. “Nontraditional, high-margin menu items, such as iced coffee drinks, breakfast items and wraps,” featured in “unsaturated markets while experimenting with different store formats,” will help generate growth, the report stated.

Furthermore, the collective habits may change everything from coffee retailers’ food and beverage offerings to their physical store layouts. The IBISWorld report stated:

Major operators, such as Starbucks and Dunkin’ Donuts, are expected to expand their menus and remodel the designs of their locations over the five years to 2023 to increase sales and draw a wider range of customers.

Assessing the Risk of Growth
The forecast was certainly prophetic, considering that Starbucks announced plans to close 150 stores due to underperformance just last week. It seems that more manageable expansion efforts will level some profit margins; where Starbucks wanted to hit 3-5% growth, 1% is more pragmatic. According to the company’s statement:

Starbucks is optimizing its U.S. store portfolio at a more rapid pace in FY19, including shifting new company-operated store growth to underpenetrated markets, slowing licensed store growth, and increasing the closure of underperforming company-operated stores in its most densely penetrated markets to approximately 150 in FY19 from a historical average of up to 50 annually. In FY19, this will result in a slightly lower growth rate in net new company-operated stores. 

Last August, Risk Management Monitor reported that Starbucks’ expansion efforts were to the point that there was almost a store on every corner—with an estimated 3.6 locations within a one-mile radius of each other. The realization marked the end of an aggressive growth strategy, in which 8,000 shops were added over a seven-year period. It was also underscored by a 1% downgrade in its share price. IBISWorld still ranks ‘Bucks as the leader of the coffee and snack shops market in the U.S. with a 23.2% market share (followed by Dunkin’ Brands at 17%), and the move is apparently part of a refocused strategy.

Michael J. Mazarr, a senior political scientist at RAND Corporation noted that reassessing Starbucks’ growth rate will help maintain its leadership status. And while businesses can learn by following the company’s example, they should ask deeper, more strategic questions.

“Clearly a major risk to a company like [Starbucks] would be even a modest swing in consumers who believe that the company has gotten too big. The fascinating questions would be: ‘To what extent did they analyze this?,’ ‘anticipate possible changes?,’ ‘think clearly about risks and outcomes?,’ and ‘did they get some assumptions or expectations slightly wrong?” Mazarr told Risk Management Monitor. “Businesses obviously have invalid expectations all the time—not all of those cases are examples of failed risk management or being blind to consequentialist thinking. Sometimes they are trying to think deeply and rigorously about consequences; they just guess wrong.”

Mazarr has contributed to Risk Management magazine with an article exploring consequence management and the “character of risk,” which you can read here.