#4. Morten Therkildsen - Roskilde Festival, IBIT 2023, evolution of formal education, Safety and Security, Zone Ex, politics, high reliability organisation, definition of a Crowd Manager
In my first in person podcast episode, I sit down with Morten Therkildsen, Director of Safety at Roskilde Festival in Denmark. We caught up at the IBIT 2023 Conference in Cologne, where we were both speaking. I represented the Global Crowd Management Alliance speaking about Zone Ex, and Morten spoke about the meaning of, and how we use the words Safety and Security, especially as they are the same word in some languages.
We spoke about some of the sessions we sat in, such as the Love Parade: Lessons Learned by Prof Doc Jurgen Gerlach and Figen Murray’s presentation about Martyn’s Law (Protect Duty). Our discussion continued into the importance and evolution of formal education, how the events industry should be classed as "high reliability organisation”, political influences, the definition and competency of “Crowd Managers”, proximate and distal risk and where we need to go next.
As this is recorded live in the RheinEnergies Stadium, there are background noises of talking, bottle crates and the Football Club’s mascot reminding us of session start times. This is a casual conversation between two members of the Global Crowd Management Alliance, hopefully demonstrating the importance of international exchange, something which IBIT and the GCMA champion and facilitate.
Thank you to Morten for taking the time to talk with me and thank you to Sabine Funk of IBIT for the invitation to speak at this year’s conference. It was my first conference abroad and I revelled in the opportunities of meeting with and learning from experienced safety professionals from Germany, Austria, Denmark, Finland and the Netherlands.
Morten’s LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/mortentherkildsenrfx/