It's here! Browse the 2024 Penguin Christmas gift guide
How to Survive a Crisis

How to Survive a Crisis

Lessons in Resilience and Avoiding Disaster

Summary

'David Omand is exactly the man you need in a crisis' RORY STEWART

From the former Director of GCHQ comes a guide to surviving crises using the latest intelligence strategies

War, terrorism, cyberattack, climate change, the threat of AI: it has never been more important to be prepared for the crises that await us.

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 we are prepared for it.

'This book is the instruction manual we all need' SIR ALEX YOUNGER, CHIEF OF MI6

UPDATED WITH A NEW FOREWORD

Reviews

  • David Omand is one of Britain's most distinguished public servants - he combines deep experience from an exceptional career in public service with a rare capacity for communicating complexity, and the challenges of government and intelligence. He is exactly the man you need in a crisis
    Rory Stewart

About the author

David Omand

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 GCHQ.
Learn More

More from this Author

Sign up to the Penguin Newsletter

For the latest books, recommendations, author interviews and more