The Association of Continuity Professionals is a professional organization that provides a forum for networking and sharing of information for business continuity, emergency management and disaster recovery practitioners throughout a network of local chapters.  The Los Angeles Chapter primarily serves the Los Angeles County area, but all are invited to attend meetings regardless of geographic location. Please join us!

We Want To Hear From You!
Please contact us via email.  We welcome all inquiries and are glad to provide information about the LA chapter, meeting sponsorship opportunities, membership benefits, and more.

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

CONNECT WITH US

• Email: acplosangeleschapter@gmail.com
• LinkedIn: Los Angeles

UPCOMING EVENTS 

PAST EVENTS

9/17/24: USC Tour - Insights into Campus Emergency Response

For our National Preparedness Month meeting in September 2024, ACP membership will be attending a behind-the-scenes tour of the University of Southern California. USC is a city within a city and operates 24/7 on two campuses in the greater Los Angeles area and multiple facilities located throughout California. Join us as we discuss best practices for Institutions of Higher Education including day to day emergency operations, preparedness, training, exercises, large-scale events action planning, and continuity of operations.

6/11/24: Southern California Edison on Business Resiliency 

ACP LA's July 2024 meeting will feature representatives from Southern California Edison, one of the nation's largest electric utilities who has delivered electricity to Southern and Central California for over 135 years. SCE will share information about their own response capabilities during wildfire events and other emergency events. They will also share information on business preparedness and innovative ways to build a disaster-resilient business through energy solutions.

View the recording here!

3/12/24: StormGeo Weather Intelligence

ACP's March 2024 meeting will feature StormGeo, a global private weather service that provides weather risk intelligence to help companies protect their assets. This innovative company provides services to many business industries, including shipping, healthcare, oil & gas, energy, and more. While the world faces extreme weather and the effects of climate change, StormGeo assists companies adapt to changing conditions, augmenting sustainability through digitalization.

View the recording here!

10/10/2023: Chapter Event  - SoFi Stadium Tour

For our October 2023 meeting, ACP membership will be attending a behind-the-scenes tour of SoFi Stadium. During the tour, the ACP Board hopes to learn what continuity and preparedness planning and coordination goes into making these events successful and safe. After the tour, an optional, "no host" lunch will be held at Cork & Batter across the street from the stadium.

This in-person event is FREE to ACP members and one ACP guest who is part of the business continuity, emergency management, or security/safety field.

6/13/2023: Chapter Event with special guest Soraya Sutherlin, MPA, CEM.

Soraya Sutherlin will present "Alert & Warning: A Look from the Inside" examining why communications during a crisis can be the biggest success or failure of your response or organization.

Effective communications during a crisis is critical to the success or failure of emergency and crisis response. Communication is key during both external threat events and internal crises. Everything from employee safety and well-being to while maintaining trust and confidence in the company. It is also vital to preserve brand management, ambassadorship and an organization's reputation.

A proactive approach to crisis communications, including establishing clear guidelines and protocols in advance and training team members to be prepared to respond, are crucial to avoiding PR nightmares. Soraya will look at communicating with employees using multiple communication channels during crisis events. She will also look at establishing a Crisis Communications Plan to outline steps to be taken in an emergency and the roles and responsibilities of organization team members.

Watch the recording here!

3/14/2023: Chapter Event with special guest Joshua Bashioum from Early Warning Labs (EWL)

Joshua will walk us through a brief history of Earthquake Early Warning in the US, how it works, and who is using it to save lives. 

12/13/2022: Chapter Holiday Event with special guest Larry Sigler - Waffle House Index

Larry will present the background and show some examples of the various storms Waffle House has encountered recently. In addition, he will cover Waffle House's plan of action before and after the storm. Larry Sigler is the Director of Food Safety for Waffle House. His duties entail developing food safety policies for the company and coordinating these policies with the Operations Team. A 22-year Associate, Larry has been involved in designing training for the Waffle House Team and working with numerous departments in the ongoing food safety initiatives. Click here to view the recording!

10/11/2022 Chapter Event: Emergency Management in a Cultural Property Setting with Les Borsay

While we all have unique challenges in preparing for disasters the role of Emergency Preparedness in a cultural property such as a museum has the added responsibility of our shared cultural heritage. Les Borsay will discuss how his role at the J. Paul Getty Trust focuses not only on the safety of visitors and staff, but also paintings, sculptures, antiquities, photographs etc.  Click here to view the recording!

6/7/2022 Chapter Event: Moniotring Eathquakes in SoCal with Margaret Vinci

During this engaging conversation Monitoring Earthquakes in SoCal , Margaret will lead us through: The earthquake threat/risk in SoCal; History (then and now) with the 100th anniversary of the Caltech Seismology Lab; Earthquake tools for quick response decisions; Earthquake early warning implementation case studies; Keeping staff safe at work and home resources. View the recording here! 

4/5/2022 Chapter Event: Behind the scenes of a University Business Continuity Program with Steve Goldfarb and Narine Amroyan

Universities are cities within cities with large populations of students, staff and faculty. As a residential university, University of Southern California (USC) houses over 12,000 students and has extensive research and patient care operations at multiple campus locations in Southern California and across the globe. At its April 5th meeting, the Association of Continuity Professionals Los Angeles will host special presenters Narine Amroyan and Steven Goldfarb who will be sharing how USC ensures continuity of operations including the planning process, use of technology for business continuity planning (BCP), testing and response. View the recording here 

3/8/2022 Chapter Event: Continuity Talent Hiring & Retention

An engaging roundtable with Alicia Stevens, an accomplished staffing professional and member of the National Board for the Association of Contingency Planners, on how to effectively recruit stand-out candidates in the Business Continuity field. If you're looking to hire professionals who can take your organization's business continuity or disaster preparedness program to the next level, this is the event for you! View the slide deck here. View the recording here.

12/14/2021 Chapter Holiday Event

The 2021 Holiday Event featured, Garrett Pollard, Senior Disaster Recovery Sales Specialist with Amazon Web Services. Garrett has spent nearly a decade supporting organizations to develop and implement disaster recovery strategies to build resilience and business continuity in information technology sectors.

10/5/2021 Chapter Event: RoundTable Resume Workshop with Alicia Stevens

An engaging roundtable with Alicia Stevens, the Director of Program Development and Membership for the ACP Orange County Chapter, on how to build a stand-out resume, what BC job recruiters are looking for, how to best manage your Linkedin profile, and so much more! Alicia is an accomplished staffing professional with over 20 years of combined HR and Staffing experience in the public and private sectors. Alicia is responsible for implementing strategies that enable BC Management to recruit a high performing and motivated workforce for her clients. Alicia specializes in talent management, staffing, executive search, employment development, compensation analysis and coaching and career development. Bottom line: if you want to know what recruiters and managers are looking for, you want to know what Alicia's thinking! View the recording HERE. View the presentation HERE.

8/19/2021 Chapter Event: COVID Trends & Experiences Discussion (ACP LA Members Only)

At a special August 19th meeting, the Association of Continuity Professionals will host a discussion for ACP members only on COVID-19 trends and experiences in the field of business continuity and emergency management.

6/8/2021 Chapter Event: Preparing for the New Era of Civil Unrest with Special Guest Steven Crimando

Business continuity, security and emergency management professionals can benefit from a knowledge and understanding of the causes, warning signs and behavioral dynamics of groups, crowds and mobs that are associated with violent and destructive behavior. Such an understanding better prepares professionals for the new challenges associated with the use of social media (Twitter, Facebook, etc.) and globalization as they relate to the development of civil unrest and the potential of dangerous and violent collective behavior. This updated 60-minute program provides timely, actionable information to better protect their organizations’ personnel and assets in response to potential group, crowd or mob situations. Here is a link to the current issue of Crowd magazine, a UK-based international publication. Steve's article re: armed protests begins on page 44. Click here to access the recording. Click here to access the slide deck

3/9/2021 Chapter Event: Adaptive: A More Challenging View of Business Continuity and Resilience

Led by Mark Amour - Business Continuity is far more difficult than we are ever prepared for. When we first enter the profession this appears to be the case but then we are given a clear roadmap with the assurance that, if we stick to prescribed path, we will achieve our objective of properly preparing our organizations to respond and recover effectively should a disaster occur. The truth is the task of organizational preparedness is far more multidimensional than the linear approach associated with our profession’s standards. And it requires far more of the practitioner – in terms of skills, experience and expertise – than simply learning a methodology. In this session learn just how different the Adaptive approach is to traditional business continuity and why it requires that you get out of your comfort zone in order to practice it effectively. Click here to access the recording! (PW: iU^1cpfk)