Renae Hanvin
In this episode, I'd like to reflect on the conversations that I've had so far, what I've learned and what the key themes are that seems to be coming through. And as much as I'd like to say I planned this way starting a doing disasters differently. podcast in the middle of a pandemic, I can assure you I didn't. However, I am personally experiencing being in hopefully the final stages of the second COVID lockdown in Melbourne, Australia. And I can assure you that there is no better time to start thinking differently and doing differently in the before, during and after stage. have natural and unnatural disasters.
And as I reflect on the bushfire impacted communities in Australia, who many have just ticked over six months since those devastating fires, I like to ask the questions in terms of where are they now, given the direct and in direct impacts of COVID that have hit them so very, very hard. Because for communities like those and all of us that are experiencing this current global pandemic, what gives me hope is that that there are ways we can all contribute to building a new feature, and a new hope for a new normal that we face.
And when I say new normal, I don't mean new COVID Normal. I mean, a new normal that includes compound disasters, and both natural and unnatural ones at that. So I'd like to start this reflecting that now is a great time to reimagine to rediscover what the disaster sector is right now, and what we want and need it to be. I hope you've taken something out of the conversations I've had and it's helped you to think and do disasters a little bit differently to now in the first episode, you heard my story about why me and why now. But a number of people had asked me why I didn't put my own two things in the disaster space. I'd like to change at the end there the questions I always finish my conversations with.
So in this episode, I'm going to give you two of my areas of focus.
Before that, I think it's really valuable, though, to reflect on what I've learned from others. So those of you who have met me and know me, well also know the wonderful James Ritchie. James was with me when over coffee, I had this crazy idea that there should be more the private sector can do, and it was over that coffee, or try to be honest, the corporate2community was created. And for the past five or so years, James has reminded me that every conversation I've had with corporates or government, there's never been anyone who said that more private sector contribution is a bad idea. And to be honest, that's a really big part of why I'm still on the journey today, because there is support for activating a shared responsibility philosophy. And I guess it takes people like James and I and others out there lucky to lead the way.
In my conversation with James, one of these two things he'd like to change is moving from a siloed operations mindset into a holistic and strategic approach. And I couldn't agree more. If we thought differently, then we could act differently. His other wish is that we don't recoil post how Australia is handling COVID-19 you'd have to say there's been some positive outcomes in many ways within the sector, and glimpses of change that would bring great benefit if it continued or evolved. I agree with James. And my hope, too, is that while we are trading the COVID hamster wheel, and fighting to socially and economically survive, that there is also a dual focus from key leaders to think strategically about using this time to prepare ourselves for when something like this happens again, because this won't be the only disaster we see.
My next conversation was with Jodie Willmer, focusing on governance. An area that I really think is undervalued particularly when it comes to community led recovery. I often say community members are absolutely the best place to identify what's best for their community. Yet community members are not community recovery or strategic planning strategic planners for communities. Many have voted into community recovery roles with little understanding of what that entails. Both from a responsibility and risk management aspect good governance can set the pace for great recovery.
My conversation with Jodie demonstrated some really good examples where communities and government could benefit from an increase in governance related capabilities, all to benefit communities as a whole.
Changing direction and talking to Anna Dear from Coca Cola South Pacific was a really good opportunity to showcase someone who is driving authentic disaster response from a private sector Corporate Social Responsibility perspective. It was so great to hear her thoughs on what 2 things she'd change in the disaster space being to enable better opportunities for the private sector to collaborate and mobilize.
It's exactly what I identified when working at Australia Post many years ago, and exactly what I'm driving change in today. There is such an important role for the private sector. And it's wonderful to see the likes of Anna as a peer in the sector to support activating greater collaboration between private sector government and nonprofits is, as Anna said, where the wonderful occurs. I couldn't agree more.
And that's exactly why our approach at corporate2community always has a multi stakeholder lens. I remember during the bushfires early this year, we were advising corporates on how to give and I thought it was really strange that I always had to pose the question to who we were working with about why not tell me every reason why you should not give how you're planning to give. And the response was often quite startling. It really demonstrated there's a big lack in corporate understanding of what is helpful or what is harmful to communities during that disaster relief and response period.
Can you imagine helpful donations that would have gone straight to communities if corporate effectively knew how to give? I guess that's another podcast review.
And I just pose the concept to any corporate executive teams or leaders of corporate giving. We're about to enter the next fire season. So if you need strategic advice on how to give, now's a really good time to start thinking about it.
After an Anna, I spoke with John Blackburn. In many ways, John and i have a really different background. Yet we have both ended in agreeance that the narrative around disasters needs to change. We need to activate resilience based on an understanding of what resilience means to each of us and everyone out in the community. It's kind of a current buzzword. But resilience is really key, you know, our ability to adapt to future changes and disruptions. It's relevant for businesses as it is for communities.
I agree with John that building capabilities and disaster resilience won't be enough. And we need to activate a language that seeds in preparedness as well, because let's be honest as a nation, we're not particularly prepared. We definitely have at she'll be right frame of mind.
And without wanting to lose any element of that culture, I think it's time we took a sense check and realigned what's relevant to now. My own hope with John's focus on narrative is that we can also get the media to play along too.
It was Chris Quin, who introduced and educated me on infrastructure resilience, an area, I guess I've taken a little for granted. Having had many conversations and done presentations with Chris, I think it's a very important part of the resilience and disaster conversation. Talking with Chris, I'm pretty sure he said that there'll be more infrastructure built in the next 20 years than we have had in history, which is kind of crazy to think.
And when I asked Chris about the two things you'd like to see change, he went straight to a low hanging fruit being collaboration and partnerships. I'm starting to see a trend.
Chris and I have presented a couple of times on unified resilience alongside Dr. Margaret Morton, and it was great to have a conversation with Margaret too. Not surprisingly to those who have heard Margaret and I chat, our focus was on community resilience. Do we understand it? And are we holding back?
I really valued Margaret's honest contribution and a suggestion for the revival of a federal department of communities. As communities are the epicenter of our nation. I agree there would be more effective and efficient ways to enhance our communities if it became a national government focus.
I then spoke with Jennifer Gray Thompson from the Rebuild North Bay Foundation in California. And she has me adopting part of her fantastic tagline being the word reimagine. I love it. What a wonderfully positive and hopeful way to refer to recovery.
Let's reimagine what we want to be.
I must confess, I'm a little obsessed with that word now and I'm actively using it a few times a day. I guess in many ways that's what corporate2community all about - supporting communities and businesses to reimagine their future.
And lastly, in my most recent conversation I spoke with W. Craig Fugate. I cannot tell you how how much I've wanted to connect with Craig over the years. Since I worked at Australia Post nearly 10 years ago, the Waffle House Index has been what I would say a best practice in a business establishing a leadership culture of serving and being there for its community in the good times and the bad.
The conversation with Craig explained how an unassuming stop over for breakfast during a hurricane resulted in a fast food chain unexpectedly assisting the federal government in America to identify how our community was tracking post a devastating event.
Simple, yet so effective.
And a fantastic example of collaboration. I can't wait to activate more of that to happen here in Australia.
Now before I sign off, I'm going to ask myself the same question I have in all my conversations. So what are the two things right now that I would like to be done differently in the disaster space?
Well, my first one has to be upskilling, the emergency management and disaster resilience sector as well as private sector on the benefits of collaboration. We are so much stronger when we work together. And there is so much evidence to support tangible benefits when government and private sector understand each other, understand the roles and capabilities each other has, and then work together to activate it to the benefit all Australians.
My second wish would be to move our businesses and governments away from a siloed mindset when it comes to disaster preparedness, response, recovery and resilience and move them all towards a holistic whole of organization, whole of government and whole of community approach.
Let's reimagine for a minute how much more efficient and effective we would be if we thought bigger based not just on now, but on the futur; not just on one disaster after impact but setting ourselves up for all the future disasters ahead.
And well, we're not formally launching anything just yet but I asked you to look out for details on the Resilient Australia Alliance. It's a corporate2community national model that will be appearing seen, because I'm really excited to be leading the solution that will activate what so many are saying about change that's needed in the disaster space.
I'd like to thank all my wonderful guests who have had conversations. I've learnt so many things from each one. And I'm really excited with the conversations that I've got coming up next, so make sure you stay tuned.
That's about all for me. I'll sign off for my COVID stage for lockdown with an 8pm curfew in Melbourne in Australia, and look forward to sharing more conversations with peas in the disaster space with you very soon.
Thanks for listening.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
In this episode, I'd like to reflect on the conversations that I've had so far, what I've learned and what the key themes are that seems to be coming through. And as much as I'd like to say I planned this way starting a doing disasters differently. podcast in the middle of a pandemic, I can assure you I didn't. However, I am personally experiencing being in hopefully the final stages of the second COVID lockdown in Melbourne, Australia. And I can assure you that there is no better time to start thinking differently and doing differently in the before, during and after stage. have natural and unnatural disasters.
And as I reflect on the bushfire impacted communities in Australia, who many have just ticked over six months since those devastating fires, I like to ask the questions in terms of where are they now, given the direct and in direct impacts of COVID that have hit them so very, very hard. Because for communities like those and all of us that are experiencing this current global pandemic, what gives me hope is that that there are ways we can all contribute to building a new feature, and a new hope for a new normal that we face.
And when I say new normal, I don't mean new COVID Normal. I mean, a new normal that includes compound disasters, and both natural and unnatural ones at that. So I'd like to start this reflecting that now is a great time to reimagine to rediscover what the disaster sector is right now, and what we want and need it to be. I hope you've taken something out of the conversations I've had and it's helped you to think and do disasters a little bit differently to now in the first episode, you heard my story about why me and why now. But a number of people had asked me why I didn't put my own two things in the disaster space. I'd like to change at the end there the questions I always finish my conversations with.
So in this episode, I'm going to give you two of my areas of focus.
Before that, I think it's really valuable, though, to reflect on what I've learned from others. So those of you who have met me and know me, well also know the wonderful James Ritchie. James was with me when over coffee, I had this crazy idea that there should be more the private sector can do, and it was over that coffee, or try to be honest, the corporate2community was created. And for the past five or so years, James has reminded me that every conversation I've had with corporates or government, there's never been anyone who said that more private sector contribution is a bad idea. And to be honest, that's a really big part of why I'm still on the journey today, because there is support for activating a shared responsibility philosophy. And I guess it takes people like James and I and others out there lucky to lead the way.
In my conversation with James, one of these two things he'd like to change is moving from a siloed operations mindset into a holistic and strategic approach. And I couldn't agree more. If we thought differently, then we could act differently. His other wish is that we don't recoil post how Australia is handling COVID-19 you'd have to say there's been some positive outcomes in many ways within the sector, and glimpses of change that would bring great benefit if it continued or evolved. I agree with James. And my hope, too, is that while we are trading the COVID hamster wheel, and fighting to socially and economically survive, that there is also a dual focus from key leaders to think strategically about using this time to prepare ourselves for when something like this happens again, because this won't be the only disaster we see.
My next conversation was with Jodie Willmer, focusing on governance. An area that I really think is undervalued particularly when it comes to community led recovery. I often say community members are absolutely the best place to identify what's best for their community. Yet community members are not community recovery or strategic planning strategic planners for communities. Many have voted into community recovery roles with little understanding of what that entails. Both from a responsibility and risk management aspect good governance can set the pace for great recovery.
My conversation with Jodie demonstrated some really good examples where communities and government could benefit from an increase in governance related capabilities, all to benefit communities as a whole.
Changing direction and talking to Anna Dear from Coca Cola South Pacific was a really good opportunity to showcase someone who is driving authentic disaster response from a private sector Corporate Social Responsibility perspective. It was so great to hear her thoughs on what 2 things she'd change in the disaster space being to enable better opportunities for the private sector to collaborate and mobilize.
It's exactly what I identified when working at Australia Post many years ago, and exactly what I'm driving change in today. There is such an important role for the private sector. And it's wonderful to see the likes of Anna as a peer in the sector to support activating greater collaboration between private sector government and nonprofits is, as Anna said, where the wonderful occurs. I couldn't agree more.
And that's exactly why our approach at corporate2community always has a multi stakeholder lens. I remember during the bushfires early this year, we were advising corporates on how to give and I thought it was really strange that I always had to pose the question to who we were working with about why not tell me every reason why you should not give how you're planning to give. And the response was often quite startling. It really demonstrated there's a big lack in corporate understanding of what is helpful or what is harmful to communities during that disaster relief and response period.
Can you imagine helpful donations that would have gone straight to communities if corporate effectively knew how to give? I guess that's another podcast review.
And I just pose the concept to any corporate executive teams or leaders of corporate giving. We're about to enter the next fire season. So if you need strategic advice on how to give, now's a really good time to start thinking about it.
After an Anna, I spoke with John Blackburn. In many ways, John and i have a really different background. Yet we have both ended in agreeance that the narrative around disasters needs to change. We need to activate resilience based on an understanding of what resilience means to each of us and everyone out in the community. It's kind of a current buzzword. But resilience is really key, you know, our ability to adapt to future changes and disruptions. It's relevant for businesses as it is for communities.
I agree with John that building capabilities and disaster resilience won't be enough. And we need to activate a language that seeds in preparedness as well, because let's be honest as a nation, we're not particularly prepared. We definitely have at she'll be right frame of mind.
And without wanting to lose any element of that culture, I think it's time we took a sense check and realigned what's relevant to now. My own hope with John's focus on narrative is that we can also get the media to play along too.
It was Chris Quin, who introduced and educated me on infrastructure resilience, an area, I guess I've taken a little for granted. Having had many conversations and done presentations with Chris, I think it's a very important part of the resilience and disaster conversation. Talking with Chris, I'm pretty sure he said that there'll be more infrastructure built in the next 20 years than we have had in history, which is kind of crazy to think.
And when I asked Chris about the two things you'd like to see change, he went straight to a low hanging fruit being collaboration and partnerships. I'm starting to see a trend.
Chris and I have presented a couple of times on unified resilience alongside Dr. Margaret Morton, and it was great to have a conversation with Margaret too. Not surprisingly to those who have heard Margaret and I chat, our focus was on community resilience. Do we understand it? And are we holding back?
I really valued Margaret's honest contribution and a suggestion for the revival of a federal department of communities. As communities are the epicenter of our nation. I agree there would be more effective and efficient ways to enhance our communities if it became a national government focus.
I then spoke with Jennifer Gray Thompson from the Rebuild North Bay Foundation in California. And she has me adopting part of her fantastic tagline being the word reimagine. I love it. What a wonderfully positive and hopeful way to refer to recovery.
Let's reimagine what we want to be.
I must confess, I'm a little obsessed with that word now and I'm actively using it a few times a day. I guess in many ways that's what corporate2community all about - supporting communities and businesses to reimagine their future.
And lastly, in my most recent conversation I spoke with W. Craig Fugate. I cannot tell you how how much I've wanted to connect with Craig over the years. Since I worked at Australia Post nearly 10 years ago, the Waffle House Index has been what I would say a best practice in a business establishing a leadership culture of serving and being there for its community in the good times and the bad.
The conversation with Craig explained how an unassuming stop over for breakfast during a hurricane resulted in a fast food chain unexpectedly assisting the federal government in America to identify how our community was tracking post a devastating event.
Simple, yet so effective.
And a fantastic example of collaboration. I can't wait to activate more of that to happen here in Australia.
Now before I sign off, I'm going to ask myself the same question I have in all my conversations. So what are the two things right now that I would like to be done differently in the disaster space?
Well, my first one has to be upskilling, the emergency management and disaster resilience sector as well as private sector on the benefits of collaboration. We are so much stronger when we work together. And there is so much evidence to support tangible benefits when government and private sector understand each other, understand the roles and capabilities each other has, and then work together to activate it to the benefit all Australians.
My second wish would be to move our businesses and governments away from a siloed mindset when it comes to disaster preparedness, response, recovery and resilience and move them all towards a holistic whole of organization, whole of government and whole of community approach.
Let's reimagine for a minute how much more efficient and effective we would be if we thought bigger based not just on now, but on the futur; not just on one disaster after impact but setting ourselves up for all the future disasters ahead.
And well, we're not formally launching anything just yet but I asked you to look out for details on the Resilient Australia Alliance. It's a corporate2community national model that will be appearing seen, because I'm really excited to be leading the solution that will activate what so many are saying about change that's needed in the disaster space.
I'd like to thank all my wonderful guests who have had conversations. I've learnt so many things from each one. And I'm really excited with the conversations that I've got coming up next, so make sure you stay tuned.
That's about all for me. I'll sign off for my COVID stage for lockdown with an 8pm curfew in Melbourne in Australia, and look forward to sharing more conversations with peas in the disaster space with you very soon.
Thanks for listening.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
Transcript source: Provided by creator in RSS feed: download file