Compass 2023 key takeaways: The evolution of business continuity
Compass, Fusion’s annual customer summit, brings our global customers together in person to learn from other industry leaders and build their continuity and resilience capabilities. This year, we were thrilled to be able to bring our Fusion community together in New York and London again, and we’re so proud of the overwhelmingly positive feedback that we’ve received. Compass 2023 provided an open forum for our customers to discuss their evolving business continuity and risk management programs as well as share their challenges, successes, and unique approaches to building robust resilience practices.
Attendees were treated to keynote sessions, large panel sessions, and smaller breakouts that offered an ideal environment to explore real-world examples and solutions that are driving the evolution of business continuity and operational resilience program management. We learned directly from customers in our Community Exchange, case study, and panel sessions about how different organizations are approaching and overcoming disruption. In between sessions, attendees had the opportunity to connect and network with their peers and industry professionals. We were also pleased to unveil several upcoming product developments during the events, including the launch of our generative AI-powered assistant, Fusion Resilience Copilot.
One of my favorite soundbites from the day was that we’re now in a time of “business unusual”. The way in which we operate and think about risk – from weather-related events to supply shortages – has fundamentally changed since 2020, and it doesn’t look like we’re going back to “normal” ever again. So, our approach to managing business risk must continue to evolve forward versus referencing the past. Three key themes in this vein dominated the Compass conversation this year:
1. Third-party risk management takes center stage
Recent geopolitical crises in Europe and the Middle East as well as the “hangover” from Covid – that includes ongoing supply chain disruptions and distributed workforces – have presented new and unpredictable threats to organizations. Combined with mounting global third-party risk regulations, our industry-leading speakers were clear that it’s never been more critical for organizations to focus on third-party risk than now.
From financial services to pharmaceutical organizations, we heard firsthand accounts of how continuity and resilience professionals are proactively and reactively monitoring and engaging their third parties to help enable their product and service delivery and how they’re managing the mounting threat of third-party risks in an era of unprecedented threats.
2. Crisis prompts action
Now that the “mega-global-crisis” of Covid has largely passed, leaders must ensure that continuity and risk programs remain a priority. One business continuity leader at a Fortune 500 company noted that “sometimes you need a crisis to grab people’s attention and gain funding.” Practitioners must anticipate, plan for, and learn from every disruption that they are faced with and use those incidents as valid reasons to engage with key stakeholders, gather additional buy-in, and effectively evolve their programs.
Compass presenters shared approaches, ideas, and even example presentations and reports to demonstrate how they have effectively positioned their programs and results to gain attention, receive executive buy-in, and lobby for additional resources.
3. Generative AI is the next frontier
In his opening remarks, Fusion CEO Mike Campbell asserted that “generative AI will change the world as much as the internet did.” The sentiment echoed throughout the summit. By implementing generative AI, organizations will be able to streamline business continuity/information technology disaster recovery, third-party risk management, and scenario simulations to accelerate time to value.
Generative AI tools like Fusion Resilience Copilot will also help organizations understand data gaps and break down data silos. This starts with asking ourselves: “Is the output inconsistent with how our organization operates? This is a sign of a data gap that must be remediated.”
Attendees shared that they plan to leverage the significant time savings presented by generative AI to transform how they approach their daily responsibilities, manage disruptions, and streamline reporting. As one customer noted, “AI will allow us to integrate data to make data-based decisions. It will also help us report to leadership and gather additional buy-in.”
Tapping our global community to empower business continuity
Our Compass events offer an invaluable forum for our global community to gather, share best practices, and exchange ideas that will help all of us power the next stage of our innovation.
We are always grateful for the generosity of our customers in sharing their own continuity and resilience journeys to help our global community learn and evolve. Compass is a high point of our unique ENGAGE program, which empowers the Fusion community to exchange ideas, expand their networks, and be informed about Fusion product enhancements and capabilities. Through our ENGAGE program, we continue to strengthen our resilience ecosystem and drive organizations, teams, and careers forward. Thank you to each of our 200+ attendees, speakers, and partners for supporting this year’s event and making it a huge success.
Did you miss Compass 2023? Reach out to the Fusion team to discuss takeaways from the event and stay tuned for the next parts of our Compass blog series where we’ll take a deep dive into key conversations. Fusion customers can also access session recordings directly on Fusion Central.
