Tom Flynn ESRDublin2015 Event Chairperson talks about ESRDublin 2015

Next month the European Security Research event – The Next Wave takes place and Tom Flynn the @ESRDublin2015 Chairperson spoke to us about it.

How did the idea of the conference come about?

The event came about from an idea of trying to bridge gaps, knowledge and understandings to try and understand perspectives and different viewpoints so that when we go forward with results and projects its more closer to what the market needs. It’s understanding, the first responders point of view and it’s all about getting cross fertilisation of knowledge and capacity amongst the people who are all working very hard doing what they are doing. Sometimes it needs a bit of gel just to make it work better, come together better, and trying to make a change. Change in a positive way to get the right people coming together from different perspectives, and then meeting and discussing things which are very important given the world that we live in today.

Will it become a yearly event?

Are the guys coming across from Europe are they going to use this as a process for getting feedback on their projects?

Yes some will do that and we will have a number of things to support that. The individual projects will meet, some in silo but they will be engaging directly with the delegates and they will do this in various different ways. So lets take big data, we will have a big data and standardisations world café and what we will do is get people from different backgrounds who are interested in the subject. The will contribute on the topic of big data and the facilitator will bring all this knowledge together and that will help them go forward and that’s specifically for the AquaSmart project.
Others will have questionnaires, others will have exhibitions, others will have one to one sessions with people who will come to the event and on top of that we also have the AquaSmart project which will run in tandem to the event and they are going to invite the agriculture industry from the UK and Ireland to come and meet them so that they can demonstrate their products and where the project is going. There is a lot of interactivity going on and it’s all there to kind of breach this gap, to strengthen knowledge, to exchange understandings and at the end of the day the results from Europe will be stronger going forward as a direct result of work we’re doing at this specific event.   

If you are attending the event what will you gain from the event?

Knowledge, understanding, abilities to exchange and they will also get the opportunities to meet the projects that are developing the technologies. They will also be able to see the exhibition stands, they will be able to see what’s happening in Europe coming down the line on certain projects. They will also meet with the European Commission who is driving the whole area of crisis and emergency management. It will be an engagement exercise that they will walk away with knowledge and understanding and they will have contributed something that will help direct policy, standardisation or have a means to engage more with a project that they have an interest in so that they can help that project be stronger. Likewise they can form some kind of relationship so that they can do something down the road.