Tailored risk assessments?

One of my friends suggested that there is a market for all-hazard risk assessments for groups tailored to preparedness scenarios, similar to what the Government does for organizations and facilities, but drawing only on open source/public information.
There is a cadre of indiviuals with the necessary expertise, primarily former military, govies and contractors from the security, intelligence, counterintelligence, infrastructure protection, and disaster preparedness communities.
I’d like to find out more. Are there any companies doing tailored assessments?

Yep. I can think of a half dozen subcontractors to major federal primes that do this work all the time. Generally they do pick up teams of specialists to meet the specific requirements of the contract.

I am working with a FFDRC this week on just this kind of analytic work. It is mostly a government driven business with very occasional insurance-type work.

For the general public and business sector? Nah, I know lots of folks who haven’t been able to sustain a business. FEMA EMPG funds some specialty stuff, but most of this is already locally funded as part of FEMA Hazard Mitigation, CMS preparedness and local emergency planning planning commissions.

You’re spot on about the government customer. There are lots of models and lots of teams vying for those contracts - it’s what I did for the last decade - but I want to focus on the prepper communities in this discussion.
What does a loosely organized neighborhood group do to identify their most pressing issues? How about a very well-funded group rehabbing missile silos in the Midwest? How about the individual trying to plan how to prioritize his limited assets to save his family?
For the average prepper there are too many models and too many issues to consider, and the impact of poor decisions can be fatal. My guess is that there are very low profile individuals and small companies that service the gilt edge market, but everybody else is pretty much on their own.
The easiest answer is to put together a simple workbook, like the community based tools FEMA publishes for disaster preparedness planning, but focus on prepper topics. It could be hosted on a common machine: How about getting an app developer to build a tool for the iPad?

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Originally Posted by Bruce in WV

You’re spot on about the government customer. There are lots of models and lots of teams vying for those contracts - it’s what I did for the last decade - but I want to focus on the prepper communities in this discussion.
What does a loosely organized neighborhood group do to identify their most pressing issues? How about a very well-funded group rehabbing missile silos in the Midwest? How about the individual trying to plan how to prioritize his limited assets to save his family?
For the average prepper there are too many models and too many issues to consider, and the impact of poor decisions can be fatal. My guess is that there are very low profile individuals and small companies that service the gilt edge market, but everybody else is pretty much on their own.
The easiest answer is to put together a simple workbook, like the community based tools FEMA publishes for disaster preparedness planning, but focus on prepper topics. It could be hosted on a common machine: How about getting an app developer to build a tool for the iPad?

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After attending training with Forward Observer I did an area study on my own area which covers these topics. The course was excellent but was not all that well attended honestly, if it's not about guns or maybe band aids, most "preppers" aren't interested.

Assessments of the probability of occurrence and iimpact of most events are subjective. Most preppers I’ve met feel they have a good handle on events that can occur in their area, usually without any structured analysis and little supporting data. There’s no ‘test’ to check their analyses until an event occurs, and if their preps were inadequate they may be psychologically unable to admit their planning failures and take corrective action before the next event.
This is true for the full range of events, from very low probability/very high impact (EMP attack against CONUS), to high probability/high impact (blizzard in the Northern Great Plains). Performing an all hazard analysis, rank ordering by probability and criticality, identifying effective preplanning steps, etc., even developing a simple matrix, is difficult without training or user friendly tools. I’m glad that you found a training course that gave you the skills to do that for your local area.

I'm glad I did my own for several reasons. First, it made me much more aware of things. Reading a report is one thing-beating the pavement, talking to people, tracking down primary sources....that really brings it home. Second, when it's time to update I can do it myself. Third, having done it, I better understand the process- so I can do one for my kids as they move away to college in new places, I can prepare one for my retirement location-depending on what I find out, maybe it's better than I think OR I need to pick someplace else. A valuable skill in itself...

I don’t know what FO teaches. Something like a combination of CARVER+ and the basic FEMA model would be a good start. Go from there, modify as necessary for your level of training, data availability, etc.
Glad you’ve been successful.