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MARITIME RISK

M anaging risk has never been an easy proposition.

The bad news is that it won’t get any easier in the short term. According to Ridge Global, a U.S.- based strategic consulting and risk management fi rm, Mari- time Risk is the extent to which an entity is threatened by a circumstance or event occurring in the maritime domain, and can be attributed to assets, individuals, organizations or na- tions. Maritime Risk Management is the business practice of systematically and methodically identifying, analyzing, and mitigating threats and reducing exposures to loss faced by or- ganizations or individual stakeholders with maritime interests.

Looking at the big picture, how maritime operators and businesses decide to shape their corporate cultures will make all the difference in terms of long term viability and profi ts.

That process must involve a sharply renewed focus on all kinds of risk. That’s how former Department of Homeland Se- curity Secretary Tom Ridge and past U.S. Coast Guard Com- mandant Tom Collins see it. Their combined experience in the maritime domain and careers spent largely addressing the risks facing not just maritime businesses, but all Americans, is worth more than just a look.

Homeland Security: Global Reach; Corporate Relevance

Standing up the Department of Homeland Security in 2003 was arguably the most ambitious reorganization of govern- ment in history. Leading the fl edgling government organiza- tion of 180,000 employees and 22 individual departments was

Tom Ridge, former Pennsylvania governor and congressman.

In charge of incorporating the largest and most important

DHS component was then-U.S. Coast Guard Commandant

Tom Collins. Called on to not only defi ne and mitigate risk in the immediate wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, both had to quickly assemble the team to do it from a diverse group of sometimes unhappy participants. The effort continues today as a still uncompleted work, but the fact that it works at all is tribute to the two most prominent players in the mix.

Today, Ridge and Collins have teamed up with an impres- sive group of mostly fl ag level military offi cers to form the newest part of Ridge Global LLC. Ridge Global’s Flag Bridge brings together an elite team of former U.S Coast Guard fl ag offi cers and maritime subject matter experts to provide high- level, strategic consulting services supporting risk and sov- ereignty management initiatives in the worldwide maritime domain. Before Ridge Global and Flag Bridge, there was the Department of Homeland Security and the United States

Coast Guard. The creation of DHS brought Tom Collins his fi rst contact with Ridge, whom he worked for and with dur- ing the early years. What they both brought out of that effort is manifested today in their collaborative private sector work.

Looking back at the early days of DHS, Ridge explains, “The task of creating this department was far more complex than most people will ever realize. I say this to educate; not to complain. There was no time to establish a plan to integrate multiple units of government and 180,000 employees. Inte-

Then Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Tom Ridge speaks to the Commandant of the Coast Guard Adm, Thomas Collins, aboard a 47 foot motor lifeboat from Barnagat Light, 2003.

Photo by P

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