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Converting a Conference to 100% Virtual in One Week

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Conference organizers have been among the hardest hit by COVID-19. When your entire business is predicated on bringing people together, pivoting is not easy.

On March 12, 2020, the InsurTech NY team saw a dark future ahead. Officials had confirmed 500 people in the United States tested positive for the coronavirus, President Donald Trump had just announced restrictions on flights to and from Europe, and we were one week away from hosting the 2020 InsurTech NY Spring Conference, our annual New York City-based in-person event. We had planned to host seven panels, 20 startup competition pitches, and four TED-style talks, totaling more than 60 speakers. As part of the competition, more than 20 judges had to vote on winners in near real-time. We also promised to provide networking opportunities with one-on-one meetings for all attendees.

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For the health and safety of our guests we knew we could not continue this event in-person. Fortunately, we had experience running webinars and virtual communities and activated a preparedness plan that we created when coronavirus was still mainly in China.

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However, we knew pivoting to an all-virtual event would be a monumental challenge.

Immediately we went into action. Within 12 hours, we called every speaker and sponsor about the new format. All speakers stuck with us. We went on to draft communication to notify all attendees. We also created a full web page detailing our experience. For others who may need to shift their in-person events to virtual ones, here’s a brief roadmap with key steps that we took and may help you too:

Convert existing staff to new virtual roles. Current staff and volunteers need to be immediately converted and trained on new virtual roles. To be effective, you need people dedicated to wearing new hats and carrying out last-minute responsibilities. This may include working during after hours and weekends. Some of these roles were already defined, but others needed to be redefined. They include:

  • Speaker liaisons: Assign at least two people to ensure speakers join their sessions on time and their A/V works.
  • Stage manager: This person keeps track of time and communicates verbally to speakers to cue them.
  • Presentation controller: A dedicated person to share and run the slides for presentations.
  • Master of ceremonies (MC): A dedicated host to introduce speakers and lead transitions.
  • Help desk: At least two people with technical expertise to respond to any tech or access issues.

Over-communicate to everyone. Send “how-to” information constantly, specifically about accessing the conference itself. If possible, use multiple channels, including text and social. Even then, you may have some people who have difficulty accessing the sessions.

Organize dry runs of the entire event with your staff. This process will help you identify issues you may not have considered. Fix the issues and do another dry run. We only had time for one dry run, but could have benefitted substantially from a second.

Revamp the event to make it more entertaining.

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Attendees have other options during a virtual conference, so it is particularly essential to keep them engaged and entertained throughout the day. Some tips include:

  • Run polls and questions between sessions
  • Keep each session short and sweet
  • Create content during the breaks so they don’t “turn the dial.” We hired a professional comedian, but you can be creative on how to fill the time.

In retrospect, the event was successful for four reasons: (1) intense planning and preparation during the seven-day transition, (2) support from our speakers and sponsors to stay with us in the transition, (3) effective communication internally and externally to all stakeholders, and (4) a great team and set of volunteers that worked tirelessly to make it happen. A full guide is available with more details about how to make the transition at InsurTech NY.

Putting Risk Management on the Front Line

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Businesses in India expressed an overwhelming desire to approach risk management more strategically in this year’s Excellence in Risk Management India report, with 68% of respondents deeming “integrating risk management into strategic planning” their top priority. Today, managing risk intelligently is everyone’s responsibility—not just the company’s executives—and the question of how to enable risk management at the front line of defense (FLoD) was a key theme for Marsh’s “Enabling the First Line of Defense” panel discussion at the RIMS Risk Forum India 2019. Consistently taking the initiative is key to risk management, and panelists discussed a number of proactive strategies for enabling front-line employees to address risk.

Enabling the First Line of Defense

As risk responsibilities move to the front line, organizations will need to review how their risk framework can be adapted. To equip everyone to confidently handle risk, risk management needs to be more intuitive. Data and analytics can also play a significant role in making the process more collaborative, measurable and strategic. Backed by technology, many firms are now not only able to prevent downside risks, but have capitalized on new markets, opportunities and changes in demand.

Panelists expressed that risk management was not a priority for frontline staff like sales executives, who are more likely to be encouraged to meet sales KPIs. Reflecting on his time within financial services, panelist Sudip Basu, Hinduja’s group head of risk, said that during peak times, risk was not an important consideration, and rarely outweighed more immediate profit and success motivations. Of course, self-examination happens during down-turns, which the sector has experienced over several tumultuous decades, both in India and globally. Basu said that this was definitely the case after the global financial crisis.

Bake Risk Management into KRAs

One key activity that the panelists flagged was baking risk management into key responsibility areas (KRAs) so that risk management messaging cascades down to the front line and into business activities. However, the panelists also expressed concern about the level of monitoring being implemented alongside these KRAs, stressing the need for follow-through on good intentions and highlighting this as an area of development needed for success.

Celebrate Successes

Celebrating success is far from an unfamiliar concept, though firms may need to address how success is measured and at what level. According to panelist Jyotsna Sharma, Bridgestone India’s chief financial officer and head of IT, firms are very good at celebrating risk management successes at the senior levels, but not as good at recognizing it for front-line teams. Sharma said that it would be beneficial to build in small acknowledgements for front-line teams and employees who have done exceptional work, have been proactive or have demonstrated risk management best practices.

Acknowledge Incremental Gains

The panelists also stressed the importance of incremental gains. A  change in the front line’s perception of risk management is not likely to happen overnight. If only key milestones or large events are recognized, it could be harder to gain buy-in and ongoing support from teams on the ground. Much like celebrating wins achieved by the FLoD, acknowledging incremental gains helps the team to view the journey to success as a process, and could help FLoD initiatives to more easily gain momentum.

While the FLoD is traditionally associated with operational management, as risks grow increasingly complex and interrelated, risk management is no longer only the purview of control functions, particularly when major influences from regulatory and broader economic environment exist. Ensuring that there is adequate awareness of risks—while rewarding successes across various levels of the organization—is critical for organizations to cope with risk in the current business environment.

Spotting Coronavirus-Related Phishing Emails

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Amid widespread public concern and constantly evolving news about the COVID-19 pandemic, cybercriminals are finding new fodder for phishing campaigns. With the eagerness for new information about the coronavirus outbreak, distraction during disruption, and the disorienting shift to remote work for many, employees may be particularly susceptible to falling for these schemes right now.

Some of these phishing emails play off companies having employees work from home to launch credential-stealing attacks. Such phishing campaigns may impersonate IT teams or may direct recipients to fake login pages to access work networks or accounts remotely. See the screenshot at right for an example. Email security firm Mimecast’s Threat Intel team reported seeing over 300 examples of such a campaign using a fake OneDrive login.

“We see that threat actors are keeping up with the daily developments concerning the coronavirus,” said Mimecast’s Threat Intel team. “As the pandemic continues to spread and more and more people are made to work from home, we are seeing more phishing emails that are trying to trick users into giving their credentials through a faked login page. Threat actors are actively utilizing this pandemic to attempt to compromise individual’s accounts and organization’s networks. The potential for human error will inevitably increase in the coming weeks and we expect to see more of these phishing attempts in the coming days and weeks.”

Other phishing scams purport to be new updates from government authorities or public health organizations, directing recipients to click malicious links for updates on the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, new containment measures ordered by governments, or local advisories. Last month, the World Health Organization warned that some criminals were spoofing WHO officials to send fraudulent emails, and Kaspersky Labs reportedly found emails spoofing the CDC asking for Bitcoin donations to help fund a coronavirus vaccine. Some other phishing emails include malicious attachments purporting to be tips for protecting yourself from the coronavirus or maps of the outbreak, for example, but actually contain malware.

“We are living in a heightened time of cyberrisk,” said David Simpson, Virginia Tech professor and former chief of the Federal Communications Commission’s Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau. “Cybercriminals will take advantage of public fear and due diligence health measures to generate coronavirus-themed phishing attacks. We should be aware of unsolicited COVID-19 emails with specious links or attachments.”

To help employees detect these scams, check out the following infographic from Cofense’s Phishing Defense Center for tips on spotting coronavirus-related phishing emails:

Preparing for a Pandemic: Review Business Continuity Plans Amid Coronavirus Outbreak

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Organizations worldwide have been reacting to the recent coronavirus outbreak, COVID-19, in a variety of ways, from restricting nonessential employee travel to canceling large events. The possibility of a pandemic has the potential to disrupt workforces, supply chains and economic activity in the months ahead. So, it is with a sense of urgency that prudent organizations review and update their business continuity plans to insure their operational resiliency.

A healthy and available workforce is any organization’s most valuable asset. A pandemic will incapacitate some employees and result in other employees being quarantined. This could result in a major disruption to normal operations, with potentially large numbers of employees working from home or remote locations.

To protect your workforce and help ensure its continued productivity, it is critical to:

  • Establish a strategy that enables employees to continue to function without endangering them.
  • Have a plan to isolate employees should the threat of possible infection arise.
  • Ensure employees can effectively work from home.
  • Verify that you have the tools, technology, capacity, and security measures in place to support a large remote workforce.
  • Review your HR policies to ensure employees will not be personally impacted if they must be quarantined for an extended period and modify any policies as appropriate to give greater flexibility to normal working arrangements. 
  • Determine your priorities and the minimum staffing requirements to support these priorities, in case you need to function with a significantly reduced workforce.
  • Identify key employees and ensure other staff members have received appropriate training to comprehensively cover their absence.
  • Create a communications plan that includes providing employees and other stakeholders with regular situation updates as well as actions taken.

In a global economy, virtually every organization is connected to or dependent upon others. You may not be directly affected by a pandemic, but could be impacted if a vendor at a critical point in your supply chain is. Understanding your dependence on entities outside your organization is critical. Are your critical third parties (e.g., suppliers, vendors and service providers) prepared?

To protect your operations and ensure continuity of services or products to your customers, it is important that you:

  • Map your dependencies to understand where disruptions might impact your value chains.
  • Review the preparedness of your critical third parties (suppliers, vendors, service providers, etc.).
  • Identify single points of failure in your ecosystem.

When assessing the impact of a disruption to your ecosystem, it is important to recognize the amount of time before the actual impact occurs. So, as you review and update your plans, you should also conduct walkthroughs and exercises. This is the best method for identifying gaps in your procedures and will give you the highest chance of successful execution. Active participants will become familiar with the goals and objectives of the plan and begin to use it as guidance rather than a prescriptive list of tasks to be followed without applying rational thought. Practicing the execution of your plan ensures all necessary parties understand their roles and responsibilities.

During preparedness reviews, you should also assess the tools used to maintain relevant information and assist in executing your plans. Old technologies and obsolete tools will put successful execution of even the best plans at risk. Identify any deficiencies in the tools available and create a comprehensive list of requirements that will enhance your ability to execute. The sooner you begin to upgrade your tool set, the sooner you will be able to reduce execution risk.

An organization’s ability to effectively respond to a disruption of its workforce or a critical third-party not only depends on how effective you were in the planning process, but also how effective you were with the tools you have and the training you implemented. The tools you use to communicate, maintain situational awareness, and provide current and accurate information will also have a major impact on the execution of the plan.