What topics does the Lead Crisis Manager course cover?
The course covers the four building blocks of ISO 22361: the framework (leadership, structure, culture, competence), prevention and preparation, response, and recovery. Each block is worked through with practical cases and exercises under pressure.
ISO 22361:2022 organises crisis management into four blocks: the framework (leadership, structure, culture and competence), prevention and preparation (anticipation, assessment, mitigation and training), response (decision, communication, coordination) and recovery (stabilisation, return and organisational learning).
The course works through these blocks with a practical focus. Participants design crisis structures suited to their context, define escalation thresholds, rehearse communication procedures and examine how authority is reassigned during an activation. Trainers challenge how decisions are documented, how incomplete information is managed and how trust is rebuilt after a crisis.
The programme also connects ISO 22361 to adjacent obligations, so participants can see where crisis management meets business continuity, incident response and the reporting duties introduced by NIS 2 and DORA. This keeps the training anchored in real regulatory and operational pressure rather than theory.
Related Information
- Framework: leadership, structure, culture and competence.
- Prevention and preparation for crises.
- Response: decision, communication and coordination.
- Recovery and organisational learning.
- Practical cases and role-play under pressure.
Expert Insight
Crisis frameworks fail at the first exercise when they are built for paper. ISO 22361 works when the organisation trains, tests and learns from every activation.
“ISO 22361 becomes operational when it is trained, not when it is documented.”
What's next?
Explore related training
Browse all: Business Continuity & Crisis ManagementLead Operational Resilience Manager
This course prepares participants to design, implement, test, and improve an operational resilience management framework. It addresses the growing pressure to maintain critical services through cyber incidents, supplier failures, technology outages, regulatory scrutiny, and physical disruptions. Participants learn how to identify critical business services, set impact tolerances, assess risk, and coordinate response and recovery decisions. Abilene Academy teaches through consultant-led case work, realistic evidence review, and exam-focused coaching built from field practice. It is designed for resilience leaders, risk managers, business continuity professionals, internal consultants, and managers responsible for disruption readiness.
View courseLead Disaster Recovery Manager
This course prepares participants to initiate, develop, implement, test, and activate a disaster recovery plan (DRP) for ICT environments. Organizations face growing exposure to natural, human, and technological disruptions that legacy response plans fail to address, leaving recovery teams without tested procedures or clear accountability. Participants work through business impact analysis, risk assessment, recovery strategy design, and post-incident review across four intensive training days. Abilene Academy delivers this training through active consultants who bring operational DRP experience from real incident scenarios, not theoretical frameworks. It targets IT managers, ICT continuity professionals, risk consultants, and DR team members who own or contribute to recovery planning.
View courseISO 22301 Lead Implementer
This intensive 4-day training prepares participants to implement and manage a Business Continuity Management System (BCMS) compliant with ISO 22301:2019. It covers planning, deployment, monitoring, updates, and continual improvement, with a focus on context analysis, business impact analysis, risk.
View courseMore from Lead Crisis Manager
What does a Lead Crisis Manager actually do?
A Lead Crisis Manager builds the crisis-management capability and runs it in a live event. They organise preparation, guide the response, then steer recovery and learning.
How long is crisis management training?
The length of crisis management training depends on the level you are aiming for. Awareness for teams runs 1–2 days. The operational Crisis Manager credential — PECB Lead Crisis Manager — runs 5 days, exam included, and is aligned with ISO 22361:2022.
How do you build an effective crisis management framework?
An effective crisis-management framework defines leadership, structure, culture and skills, then tests them through scenarios. It has to make decision-making, information flow and communication explicit.
How do you integrate cyber crisis management into NIS 2 and DORA?
Both the NIS 2 Directive and the DORA regulation require formalised incident- and crisis-management arrangements with defined notification deadlines set out in their respective articles. ISO 22361:2022 provides the methodological framework for the crisis cell that responds to both regimes.
Browse all FAQs →
Full knowledge base