John Sharp provides BCM education, training and audit for a range of clients across Europe.  He also acts as a facilitator for senior management groups, assisting them to develop their own BCM capabilities. His clients include local authorities, police, health service, standards bodies and the IT and pharmaceutical industries.  In addition to his work with clients John has supported the Continuity Forum, an educational and development body, as Policy and Development Director.  He worked closely with the Civil Contingencies Secretariat in the development and promotion of good practice in BCM across the UK and assists the local authorities with their promotion of BCM to private and voluntary organisations.

From 1997 until 2004 he was the Chief Executive Officer of the Business Continuity Institute where he was responsible for delivering services to members throughout the world and working with all facets of industry, commerce and government to enhance the understanding and commitment to business continuity as a key management discipline.  One of the key tasks he undertook whilst at the BCI was the assessment of applications from across the world for professional certification.

For the past 12 years John has been a key member of the Chartered Management Institute’s team undertaking definitive research into BCM awareness across the UK. He was one of the key drivers in establishing the annual Business Continuity Awareness week in the UK and overseas and helped established the Business Continuity Expo conference and exhibition held at the Excel Centre in London Docklands.

John Sharp was chair of the committee that produced the British Standards Institution’s Guide to Business Continuity Management (PAS 56), is a member of the Technical Committee that produced the BSi BCM standard - BS 25999, and a member of the team that produced BCM guidance for the UK Civil Contingencies Act.  He supported the Department of Health in the production of BCM guidelines for the NHS in England and Scotland. Over the years he has worked closely with government, regulators, police, and security organisations to ensure a uniformity of approach in BCM.  

John is a regular speaker and chair at conferences in the UK and abroad and has lectured at the Universities of Cranfield, Nottingham and Coventry. For 5 years he was an Associate Course Director at the UK government’s Emergency Planning College where he helped develop and deliver BCM training programmes.  He is the author of The Route Map to Business Continuity Management  published by BSI in Dec 2007 and has written many articles on Business Continuity Management.  He has considerable experience of dealing with the media and has provided input to newspaper articles, radio, television and educational films.

Prior to joining the BCI John was trained as an engineer in BT and went on to hold senior positions in industry sector sales and marketing. His work involved developing business solutions for major companies within the automotive, construction, manufacturing, printing, publishing and local government sectors.   In many cases he was called upon to practise the disciplines employed in Business Continuity Management.

John holds qualifications in engineering, management and marketing and has a specific interest in process management, a key element in understanding organisational structures, which forms the basis of Business Continuity Management.  His considerable experience in the telecommunications industry has taught him the importance of building resilience into system design and his work in supply chain management has led to a clear understanding of organisational dependencies.

He is a governor of one of the UK’s largest universities where he is Chair of the Audit Committee and  Chair of his local Parish Council where he has the responsibility for the Community Resilience Plan..