Speakers

 Donald Steel, Crisis Communications Expert And Former Chief Communications Advisor For BBC

Donald Steel is a specialist in reputation and issues and crisis management, and works with companies in the UK, Europe and Asia Pacific.  He was until earlier this year the BBC's Chief Communications Adviser and was for 11 years the Corporation's Chief Media Spokesman.  In this role, he was responsible for the management of some of the biggest media stories of the decade, from the murder of the TV presenter Jill Dando, a terrorist bomb attack on BBC's London Television Centre and the kidnapping of the BBC journalist Alan Johnston to the furore in the Arab world over the BBC and Sky TV's decision not to screen a charity appeal for the people of Gaza on impartiality grounds.   He is widely regarded as an expert in the reputation and crisis communications fields and is a frequent speaker on the the topics, including at the London School of Economics.  Recent and forthcoming engagements include London, Amsterdam, Prague, Madrid, Belgrade and Skopje, and he will shortly begin an extensive speaking tour of Dubai, Mumbai, Singapore and Hong Kong. The BBC Academy, Europe's largest broadcasting training facility, made him its first Associate Fellow in 2010 and he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in 2009.  In addition to his own practice, he has just been appointed Associate Director at Johnston Associates, the UK's leading aviation PR firm, based at London Heathrow.  He is also retained as a communications adviser to the BBC.

Kevin Johnston, Director, Johnston Associates

A seasoned PR professional, Kevin Johnston is Director of Johnston Associates, one of the few specialist aviation PR firms in the UK.  Kevin has worked in the PR sector for over 20 years.  He provides a full 24 hour PR service for United Airlines in Europe, Africa and the Middle East, which includes responsibility for crisis communications.  He also provides a complete media service to Air Canada in the UK and Scandinavia and counsels a range of organisations including TAG Farnborough Airport.  Before joining the airline sector, he had PR responsibility for BAA’s Terminal 5 project and previously worked in Westminster as a parliamentary consultant. 

Kevin has spoken at various forums over the years, advising others in the industry on crisis communications and regularly provides crisis media training courses for aviation executives around the world.  He has experience in handling strategic communications and has dealt with a number of crisis situations including the European handling of 9/11.