Annual conference off to a flyer
Attendance for this year’s annual conference at the newly modernised Brighton Centre looks to be heading for new heights after an unprecedented start to bookings. By the end of February 290 places had been taken – nearly 40% up on the same time before the 2012 event in Liverpool. The conference exhibition also looks like being bigger than ever, with just five spaces left to fill.
Although the theme is ‘Celebrating 50 years’, in honour of the association’s anniversary, the programme has a very modern feel. To judge by the 26 workshops, reputation, global compliance, enterprise risk management and cyber-risk are among the hot topics; all of them are represented at least twice in the programme.
There is, however, a wide choice of break-out sessions with bread-and-butter subjects such as supply chains, property claims and fraud vying for attention with more strategic topics such as the use of insurance to facilitate mergers and acquisitions, risk governance and the impact of the recession on risk managers.
One of the most eagerly awaited occasions is the presentation by Stephen Carver of the the Cranfield School of Management, who will be unveiling Airmic’s ground-breaking report ‘Roads to Resilience’. This research is a follow-up to ‘Roads to Ruin’, which identified common factors in corporate failure and was published in 2011. This time, the aim is to highlight qualities that support resilience and how they are achieved.
One of the Airmic priorities of the past few years has been to help risk managers make an impact at senior management level. Two of our most successful members, Nicola Harvey of Christies and Helen Hayden of Tesco, will be developing this theme with a discussion about High Impact Presentations. This is an opportunity for up-and-coming professionals to learn from their more experienced colleagues.
Insurance Forum Debate
The Insurance Forum Debate is always a highlight – an opportunity for members to quiz top executives. This year Steve Hearn of the Willis Group, John Doyle of AIG, Thomas Hurlimann of Zurich, Vincent Vandendael of Lloyd’s and Stephen McGill of Aon will be in the spotlight. Anthony Hilton, City Editor at the Evening Standard, will chair the event once again.
Star speakers
Alastair Campbell and Justin Webb will be addressing plenary sessions of the conference. One of the most controversial figures of the Blair years when he ran the media operation at 10 Downing Street, Campbell was sometimes described as the ‘deputy Prime Minister’. A former BBC Washington correspondent, Webb is one of the corporation’s leading journalists as presenter of the Today programme.
For all conference information, please visit www.AirmicConference2013.com
Alastair Campbell (right) and Justin Webb (left) will be addressing plenary sessions of the conference.
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