Training

Student of the Year

by Mark Rowe

A Buckinghamshire New University graduate has been named Student of the Year at the CIR Business Continuity Awards. Roger Payne, pictured, studied an MSc in Business Continuity, Security and Emergency Management, and was recognised for the quality of his dissertation at the Awards at the London Marriott Hotel.

The dissertation was an investigation into the human factors such as groupthink, Abilene Paradox, stress, gut feel, cognitive strain and other symptoms that impact how effectively Incident Management teams respond during crisis periods.

Roger, a Senior Business Continuity Manager at RBC Capital Markets, said: “I was really surprised and overjoyed to be recognised by my peers in the industry.

“More importantly for me however was the special meaning receiving such a prestigious award meant to me due to the fact that I decided to finally do my MSc shortly after my dad passed. His passing acted as motivation and a catalyst in my life and my MSc degree was one of those important markers.”

Speaking about his qualification at Bucks New University, he said: “I believe my understanding of my chosen field of expertise has grown exponentially. Despite being in Business Continuity Management since 2004, I believe there is always ways to improve one’s knowledge and this MSc degree course has enabled me to begin to align previously siloed departments together to have a more risk-based approach to organisational resilience in all of its guises.”

On his dissertation, Roger added: “The study clearly shows that these issues are not exclusive to incident management teams but are issues faced by almost all teams across all almost all organisations when faced with stressful situations that do not fit into the normal understanding of business as usual.”

Head of School and Course Leader Phil Wood said: “This is a fantastic achievement by a committed and extremely capable student. Roger is a prime example of the type of people who thrive on our Organisational Resilience and postgraduate programmes. Before joining us, he was already highly proficient in his industry and his success on the MSc is vindication of that proficiency and of the value of education in helping students toward further career goals and success.

“Roger is the latest in a series of academic award winners for dissertations in our Master’s degree. The whole team here at Bucks New University is proud of Roger and of this recognition by a demanding industry sector.”

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