Monthly Archives

October 2019

Semester at Sea

By | BISB, News, What's New | No Comments

Every voyage, the Semester at Sea International Field Programs Office works with in-country partners, UWI-Arthur Lok Jack Global School of Business (UWI-ALJGSB), to recruit one to two outstanding university students from select port countries on the voyage itinerary to act as Interport Students (IPS). These students travel to the previous port on the itinerary, board our ship – the MV World Odyssey, and sail with the shipboard community to their port country. Two students were selected from our Bachelor of International and Sustainable Business programme, Julia Harripersad and Okera Duncan. They will sail from Brazil on November 15 to arrive in Trinidad on November 24, 2019.

Julia Harripersad, current student of Bachelor of International and Sustainable Business

Okera Duncan, current student of Bachelor of International and Sustainable Business

The primary role of the IPS is to act as a peer in cultural exchange, and provide shipboard staff and faculty with a native informant deeply familiar with the port country or city. During their time aboard the MV World Odyssey, Julia and Okera may do any or all of the following:

Responsibilities: 

  • Participate as a visitor in shipboard courses – offer personal insights from their experience growing up, living, working, and attending school in their home country
  • Share meals with student clubs or other members of the shipboard community
  • Assist the Field Office and Administrative Team with questions pertaining to their home country
  • Give a presentation on a topic of cultural or logistical interest or a topic of their passion / choosing (ex: things voyagers can see and do in port, an upcoming holiday celebration in their home country, an interesting community service initiative at their university, different types of local or regional cuisine, etiquette, etc.)
  • Host informal language lessons (if applicable)
  • Potentially assist a professor or trip liaison on an excursion during the first two days the ship is docked in their home country (depending upon schedules and professor preference)

Students will benefits from an intercultural academic exchange experience to add to one’s resume/CV as well as have the opportunity to meet peers, experience a different type of university life and culture, and make connections with faculty in a variety of disciplines.

To find out more about our Bachelor of International and Sustainable Business, Call: 645-6700 ext. 200 or email: admissions@lokjackgsb.edu.tt


Procurement Risk and Business Continuity: A Convergence

By | Uncategorized | No Comments

(CNN) A 6.0-magnitude earthquake shook Puerto Rico September 23rd striking off the coast of the island in the Atlantic Ocean. The quake hit about 49 miles north-northwest of Isabela, Puerto Rico, around 11:23 p.m. ET, according to the United States Geological Survey. The quake was felt in many other islands including, Bahamas, Haiti, Dominican Republic and more.

A 6.0 Earthquake near a critical drug manufacturing hub?

Single Point of Failures can happen at anytime, anyplace. On September 23rd a 6.0 quake occurred near Puerto Rico , a major drug manufacturing hub. It wasn’t long ago, 2017, when Hurricane Maria struck PR and disrupted the global supply of IV saline bags (did you know this?). Major faults run through a critical supply region. 49 pharmaceutical have FDA approved manufacturing facilities in PR alone. Baxter, Eli Lilly, J&J, Boston Scientific, Medtronic, ABC, and Cardinal are just a few that operate in the region. How at risk are your patients and how resilient is your supply chain?  A fellow risk practitioner, Gary Lynch, shared these interesting facts.

How wide a net do you cast when you look at emerging risks or when you undertake a “horizon scan” or do you  not do any of this?

Procurement is much more than Compliance. It involves and must consider, Force Majeure’s, Business Continuity, Disaster Preparedness, Operational risks, Financial risk, political risk et all.

In a very interconnected world, where many suppliers/vendors to your business are located regionally and internationally, how is it possible that you do not look at these risk types? Further, you must look at the risks that they, your suppliers are exposed to, even if you, as the procuring agency may not be exposed to said risk.

 

I respectfully submit that the complexity and agility of procurement risks must form part of your overall risk management methodology.

Ken Hackshaw – Lead Faculty for Professional Certificate in Enterprise Risk Management.

 

Venezuela: Financial, Operational, Culture, Political Risk Eventuated

By | Blog, executive education | No Comments

Eighteen months ago I asked the following question of an executive working in the financial sector and a very senior police officer:

Are you guys considering hiring Bi-lingual employees?

I would respectfully submit that Trinidad and Tobago should have been more prepared to treat with what has been happening over the last 2 weeks (e.g. registration of Venezuelans), if the decision makers were employing more risk based decision making such as: scenario planning/analysis and being more proactive and anticipatory.

One did not need a “crystal ball” to see what the possible scenarios and risks would have been and still is, arising out of the Venezuelan crisis.

Having said that, there are opportunities in any given crisis. The following questions therefore arises:

  • Have you and your institution conducted a risk and opportunity assessment on Venezuela and the Venezuelan migration?
  • Do you need to revisit/update our strategic plans?
  • What about your risk profile/risk appetite?
  • Have you met with your risk teams to chat about any NEW risk and opportunities around financial risk, legal, compliance, operational risk, HSE, demand risk, culture risk, disaster recovery and BCP?
  • What about our social services, not immediately but one year from now?

Trinidad and Tobago and by extension your organization has been/will be disrupted. A determination must now be made as to what is the extent of this disruption and measure/quantify both the constructive disruption element and the negative disruptive potential. 

The velocity and complexity of the risks we are exposed to is rising. How prepared are you ?

Ken Hackshaw – Lead Faculty for Professional Certificate in Enterprise Risk Management. Find out more about our Professional Certificate in Enterprise Risk Management at 868-645-6700 ext. 367

How safe is your IT Infrastructure?

By | Blog, executive education | No Comments

“So there is no reason for us to be overly concerned about an intentional attack on data.” National Security Minister Stuart Young

I respectfully disagree with the Honorable Minister: Given these “little events” there is reason to have some concern with respect to your data.

  • Have your organization ever conducted threat and vulnerability assessments of your facility, infrastructure and operations inclusive of your information technology systems?
  • How much due diligence have you done on the vendor you engaged for your IT systems?
  • How secure are the systems/applications said vendor(s) are using ?
  • And is your BCP  tested?

Cyber security, like risk management are buzzwords that are bandied about and discussed but apparently not actioned.

A riddle for you:

There are five executives in a meeting discussing cyber security. 3 of them have decided to enhance their IT security. How many have not enhanced their IT security?,,,,,,,,,,NONE

Decisions and agreements if not operationalized/implemented is just that….decisions and agreements. 

Decisions must be followed by actions.

The recent “infiltration” or hacking of the websites of state entities demonstrate, in my humble opinion, that there are players out there that have the capability to attack the technology infrastructure of institutions in Trinidad and Tobago, and if one extrapolates these events, there is nothing that prevents them from doing or attempting to do the same to organizations in the private sector. That said, the assumption maybe that these private organizations have MORE integrated IT security employed to protect themselves than the public sector. And many do.

In the last 3 months some US cities , like Baltimore and Albany (NY), where Ransomware was employed by hackers, totally shut down many critical sites that serves the public and  these cities were asked to pay a “ransom” to be allowed to regain access to their systems. Are we there yet? (Ransomware attacks use malware to lock out users unless the hackers get paid)

Is your organization sleepwalking into one crisis after another?

Let’s be careful out there.

Ken Hackshaw – Lead Faculty for Professional Certificate in Enterprise Risk Management. For more information on this professional certificate 868-645-6700 ext. 367

Side Widget Area

Click here to assign widgets to this area.

X

Designed & Developed by Efoundry Digital Agency Ltd.