John Hamilton, Director of Civil Defence Emergency Management, is one of the few who knows what it is like to be responsible for the control and co-ordination of a major natural disaster when, following a declaration of a state of national emergency, all the nation’s resources are available for deployment in the response. John held the appointment of National Controller during the response to the 2011 Christchurch earthquake.  He is going to talk through his experiences in Christchurch from an organisational and personal perspective as the response organisation adapted to the scale of the emergency and coordinated resources to deliver the best outcomes for the city, its people and New Zealand. John will use his experiences to share with the audience the lessons he learned in this response about adapting the organisation, structures and thinking to the situation encountered in “big one”.