Centre for Crisis & Risk Communications

Course Facilitators

Benjamin Morgan spent 16 years serving community as an Advanced Life Support Paramedic. During his years of service, he held the role of Public Education Officer with the City of Calgary Emergency Medical Services. It was in this role that Benjamin discovered a passion for communications. He returned to academic studies and completed a Master’s Degree in Professional Communications at Royal Roads University. Upon completion of his degree, Benjamin returned to the City of Calgary in a newly created position, Supervisor Crisis Communications. In this role, he was responsible for municipal risk, crisis, and issues communication. During this period, Benjamin was accountable for municipal communications during the 2013 Calgary Floods. As a volunteer member of Canada Task Force 2, he was deployed to Fort McMurray where we managed local communications during the 2016 Fort McMurray wildfires. During both of these events, Benjamin worked with provincial and federal governments, coordinating co

Course Facilitators

Suzanne is a driven and passionate communications professional with a strong history of community leadership, advocacy, and non-profit work. Suzanne studied psychology at UVIC and UBC, and graduated with her Master’s of Professional Communication from Royal Roads University in May 2022. As a Senior Associate, at the Centre for Crisis Communications, she has supported several clients including the City of Saskatoon and the City of Merritt. She is Associate Faculty at Royal Roads University as a Teaching Assistant in the Master of Arts in Disaster and Emergency Management. She is an ardent believer in the importance of clear, concise communication, especially in times of crisis, and values honing her craft in the service of others.

Course Facilitators

Timothy Coombs (PhD from Purdue University in Public Affairs and Issues Management) has held the Abell Endowed Professorship in Liberal Arts at Texas A&M University. He has received the 2002 recipient of Jackson, Jackson & Wagner Behavioral Science Prize from the Public Relations Society of America, the 2013 Pathfinder Award from the Institute of Public Relations in recognition of his research contributions to the field and to the practice, and the 2014 Business Impact Award from the Association for Business Communication and USC Marshall School of Business, Center for Management Communication. Dr. Coombs has won multiple PRIDE awards from the Public Relations Division of the National Communication Association for both books and research articles and was selected for the prestigious Arthur W. Page Society. Dr. Coombs was a Fulbright Scholar in Estonia in the Spring of 2013. In the Fall of 2013, he was the named NEMO Professor at Lund University, Helsingborg Campus. In 2015 he was invited to lecture at Tsinghua University, Beijing China. From 2015 to 2020 he was designated an honorary professor in the Department of Business Communication at Aarhus University. He is the past editor for Corporation Communication: An International Journal. Dr. W. Timothy Coombs’ primary research focuses on crisis communication. In 1995, he published the first article that would lead to the articulation of the Situational Crisis Communication Theory (SCCT). SCCT is recognized as one of the most influential theories in crisis communication. His work has been at the forefront of establishing crisis communication as an identifiable research field within corporate communication. The recognition of his expertise is reflected in the variety of speaking engagements in U.S., Europe, and Asia. He has keynoted at a number of academic and practitioner conferences as well as lecturing on crisis communication at a number of international academic institutions.