Our team

Rick is a senior advisor in organisational resilience and strategic risk mitigation and is a founding partner of resilience and crisis specialists ResilienC. With over 20 years’ experience as a Partner at Deloitte and KPMG, he was also Chair of the British Standards Institution Technical Committee for Continuity and Resilience, where he has been influential in the development of British and International Standards in the field.  He is a member of the Cabinet Office Behavioural Science Expert Group as part of the National Security Risk Assessment process for the UK, and a visiting professor at King's College London and visiting fellow at Cranfield University School of Management. He was a contributor and co-editor of the National Preparedness Commission’s report: Resilience Reimagined: A Practical Guide for Organisations.

Visit Rick's LinkedIn profile here. 

Seth Schultz is Chief Executive of Resilience First's partner, Resilience Rising. He has a long track record of building consensus and initiating change in the field of sustainable development, and of raising international awareness on the role of cities in tackling climate change.

With over 20 years of experience, Seth’s background is as a geologist and environmental scientist. Driven by the need to create change in urban sustainability he has worked with leading and innovative organizations in this space including the Louis Berger Group, the US Green Building Council, the Clinton Foundation, C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, the Global Covenant of Mayors, and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), where he was Co-Chair of the Scientific Steering Committee for Cities IPCC and served as a lead author on the ground breaking IPCC Special Report on 1.5 Degrees.

His recent work has focused on turning theory to practice, whether developing a global standard for Greenhouse Gas Emissions in cities, founding new organizations such as The Coalition for Urban Transitions, or a hard-hitting report on Mayoral powers and the ability and need for city leaders to become global change makers.

Seth sits on various boards and advisory councils, is a sought-after speaker and guest lecturer, and has authored numerous articles, reports, blogs and thought leadership pieces around the world. He has a bachelor’s degree in Environmental Science from Binghamton University.

Visit Seth's LinkedIn profile here.

George is responsible for the development of a risk and resilience programme in the organisation, leading on multiple projects and initiatives including the Turning the World Risk Poll into Action project, funded by Lloyd’s Register Foundation.

From 2019 to 2022, he was Greece's Deputy Secretary-General for Civil Protection. Before that, he was Technical Officer at the European Commission Joint Research Center, where his area of expertise revolved around emergency management, critical infrastructure protection and hybrid threats. Prior to joining the Joint Research Center, he was a Disaster Management Consultant. He has worked in four countries, developed two strategic national risk assessments, helped organize over 60 exercises, developed a dozen emergency operations plans and responded to disasters in the field. He also was a Research Scientist at the Technical University of Crete in Greece, where his interdisciplinary research lay at the intersection of systems engineering and disaster resilience.

George earned his Doctorate in Environmental Science and Engineering from Saint-Etienne School of Mines in France. He also holds degrees in Civil Engineering, Disaster Management and Business Administration, and is a Certified Emergency Manager by the International Association of Emergency Managers.

Visit George's LinkedIn profile here.

Born and raised in Venice, Italy, Laura obtained two master’s degrees in Languages, Economic & Legal Institutions of East Asia  from Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, and Advertising: Art Direction & Copywriting from the European Institute of Design. She worked in several countries before settling in the UK in 2014.

As a marketing strategist, she plays a crucial role in planning and delivering a programme of activities to engage and grow Resilience First’s membership base.

Laura has gained a wealth of knowledge while creating and delivering engaging, effective, and often award-winning communications campaigns across digital and traditional channels. She is multilingual and that along with her global work experience has allowed Laura the opportunity to explore and adapt to a variety of professional cultures.

Visit Laura’s LinkedIn profile here.

Laura Saarinen is in the Operations team at Resilience First. She joined from NCD Alliance, a global civil society network where she worked as part of their Partnerships & Membership team.

Laura started her career as a journalist in her home country in Finland, and later supported the work of the press offices at the U.S. embassies in Sweden and the UK. More recently, Laura coordinated media development activities under an international, cross-sector consortium at Thomson Reuters Foundation. Prior to that, she coordinated the set up and delivery of a pilot grants programme at Institute for Strategic Dialogue, in collaboration with Google.org.

Laura is passionate about supporting and building strong teams, and developing networks and programmes that are diverse, inclusive, and have long-term impact on societal challenges.

Before moving to the UK, Laura completed a BA in journalism in Finland and an MA in media and communication studies in Sweden.

Theo previously worked as a Campaign Manager at Resilience Rising. Prior to this he worked for the Resilience Shift.

He has a background in campaigns and coalition building where he has worked at the national and sub-national level across Europe, North America and Africa within the private and public sector.

In 2021 he was seconded from the Resilience Shift to the UN Climate Champions team to coordinate the Race to Resilience campaign and establish the Resilience Hub at COP26, the first-time resilience has had a permanent home at a COP.

His professional and personal interests include mobilising non-state actors to understand and build resilience to the impacts of climate change and expanding opportunities for young people to participate in policy making and advocacy.

He holds a first-class degree in International Relations and is slowly improving at Spanish.