How to Survive a Crisis by David Omand

’David Omand is exactly the man you need in a crisis’ Rory Stewart

’An extraordinary achievement. Probably the best book ever written on crisis management’ Christopher Andrew, author of Defence of the Realm

We never know when a crisis might explode. Some ’sudden impact’ events, such as terrorist attacks or natural disasters, blow up out of a clear blue sky. Other ’slow burn’ crises smoulder away for years, often with warning signs ignored along the way until, as if from nowhere, the troops storm the palace.

In How to Survive a Crisis, Professor Sir David Omand draws on his experience in defence, security and intelligence, including as Director of GCHQ and UK Security and Intelligence Coordinator, to show how you can detect a looming crisis and extinguish it (or at least survive it with minimum loss).

Using gripping real-world examples from Omand’s storied career, and drawing lessons from historic catastrophes such as Chernobyl, 9/11, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill and the WannaCry ransomware cyberattack, this empowering book is filled with practical advice on how to survive the multiplying crises of the future. Not every crisis need tip into disaster - if we have invested in personal, business and national resilience.

This is an essential toolkit for our turbulent twenty-first century, as well as an exhilarating read for anyone interested in the state of our world - and how we might improve it.

’Piercingly insightful, brilliantly lucid and illuminating, frightening and wise…From nuclear meltdown to apocalyptic cyber-attacks, from pandemics to the drums of war, here is a remarkable record of how the threads of society can be held firm in the darkest days’ Sinclair McKay, author of Berlin

’An amazing book. Timely, essential and important. The brilliantly insightful David Omand draws on his unmatched experience to explore the complexities of crisis. He shows us how poor preparation leads to failure, but applied intelligence saves lives’ Richard Aldrich, author of GCHQ

’This book is the instruction manual we all need’ Sir Alex Younger, Chief of MI6

David Omand was the first UK Security and Intelligence Coordinator, responsible to the Prime Minister for the professional health of the intelligence community, national counter-terrorism strategy and “homeland security”. He served for seven years on the Joint Intelligence Committee. He was Permanent Secretary of the Home Office from 1997 to 2000, and before that Director of GCH