How to Survive a Crisis

'Sir David Omand is undoubtedly one of the most able people to have served in British government since the Second World War' Times Literary Supplement

We never really know when a crisis might arise. Some 'sudden impact' events, like terrorist attacks or natural disasters, blow up suddenly out of a clear blue sky. But some crises burn and fester slowly, often with warning signs underestimated or ignored along the way until, as if from nowhere, a tipping point is reached and a wildfire spreads at a ferocious rate. By then, it might be close to impossible to pull things back.

In How to Survive a Crisis, Professor Sir David Omand, formerly both a director of GCHQ and the UK's Security and Intelligence Coordinator, shows how to manage crises in their myriad forms, using methodologies employed by the British intelligence agencies. Using gripping real-world examples from Omand's storied career, including chairing the COBR room in the storm of a crisis, to lessons from historic crises such as Chernobyl, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill and the WannaCry ransomware cyber-attack, this deeply empowering book shows what we can do as individuals and societies to increase our resilience in the face of ever-multiplying crises.

A toolkit for our age of crisis, this is a spellbinding read for anyone interested in the state of our world - and how we might improve it.