About this workshop

This interactive workshop will focus on bridging research and practice in disaster recovery. It will include multiple presentations, problem-solving through a recovery scenario, and identification of ways we can incorporate the last 50 years of research on recovery into practice. Together, these activities will increase understandings of the problems we may encounter when working in disaster recovery and ways of addressing them. There will be a particular focus on the ‘thorny’ problems in disaster recovery that are not straightforward to solve.

The session will be led by Dr Kate Brady, alongside guest contributors invited by AIDR for their deep expertise in recovery and community impacts. The workshop will include a mix of presentations, interactive exercises, breakout groups, and whole‑of‑group discussions.

What participants will learn

Delegates who attend this session will:

• Gain an in depth understanding of key principles of disaster recovery
• Understand interconnected disaster impacts that are relevant to working in recovery
• Increase capacity to understand and work with others in multi-stakeholder recovery environments
• Have the opportunity to network with delegates with similar interest in disaster recovery and collaboration to build resilience and reduce disaster risk
• Understand ways of addressing ‘thorny’ issues in disaster recovery in cascading and compounding disasters
• Build cross sector networks through structured collaboration and informal networking breaks.

Presenter

Dr Kate Brady
Senior Research Fellow, HowWeSurvive, University of New South Wales

Kate has had a distinguished career in disaster recovery operations, programming and research. Kate is the Senior Research Fellow for the UNSW How We Survive initiative, is an Honorary Academic Specialist at the University of Melbourne and is the Technical Adviser to Australian Red Cross Emergency Services, where she established and led the disaster recovery program for 12 years. 

Most of Kate’s work focuses on what people find helpful and unhelpful after disasters. Throughout her career, Kate has had significant influence on State and National emergency management policy and has an international profile in collective trauma, resilience and in disaster recovery programming and policy. Kate is a co-author on the Australian Disaster Recovery Framework, the Australian Community Recovery Handbook and was an advisor in the development of the National Disaster Mental Health Framework. In 2021, she became the host for ABC’s podcast ‘After the Disaster’ and in 2025 was invited to do a TEDx talk.

Host

Katelyn Samson
Deputy Director, Australian Institute for Disaster Resilience