When Bruce Grady was given the chance to try a new role in the Queensland Public Service in 2006, he grabbed the opportunity with both hands. After being hand-selected for the Executive Mobility Program, Bruce changed pace from his existing role in commercial asset management and lifecycle tracking into emergency services management. And he hasn’t looked back.
The timing of the transition proved a game-changer for Bruce as in his first months of this new role he faced Tropical Cyclone Larry and its aftermath in Queensland. The following years saw the longest continuous cycle of natural disasters in the state’s recorded history with the 2010-2011 floods one of the worst and most costly for Queensland.
When the 2010-2011 floods hit, Bruce was Assistant Director-General of Emergency Management Queensland and saw firsthand the devastating impact floods have on a community. Bruce remembers one of the greatest challenges in this period was in not being able to give accurate enough information to those affected.
“We knew that floods would impact an area but we were unable to accurately say when the flood would hit, how high it would be, and exactly which infrastructure, streets and properties would be most affected,” said Bruce.
“Emergency management requires a high level of situational awareness and delays in receiving information or not being able to keep up with rapidly changing conditions makes it difficult to manage the situation. Moving response teams through affected areas, and providing the community with adequate information so they can make informed decisions is key, and many of the existing systems used are simply not able to cope when disaster strikes.”
Bruce says his decision to join FloodMapp is because he can see the company is providing a critically needed solution to better manage flood events. As a leading decision maker in emergency management, Bruce is now at FloodMapp to make sure the product gets into the hands of those at the helm of response and recovery. He hopes that widespread adoption of FloodMapp’s modelling systems - ForeCast, NowCast and PostCast - will mean that communities are better prepared for floods in the first place, rather than bouncing back after the event happens.
“Community engagement is integral to any emergency response,” says Bruce. “FloodMapp can support those communities by providing real time, hyperlocal inundation mapping so that people can assess their personal safety and plan for moving assets or otherwise mitigating damage. That is a game changer”
Co-Founder and CEO of FloodMapp Juliette Murphy is excited to have Bruce join the team.
“Bruce brings with him years of experience in the public service and in leading emergency response and management. Having Bruce join our team will help us scale the company and provide our engineers and software developers with unique insights into how FloodMapp can be deployed and used by emergency responders during an event,” said Juliette.
Bruce describes himself as a generalist and is looking forward to moving from the public sector to the startup world. He has a keen interest in how technology is being applied in the real world to help make our lives easier, safer and more productive. And his advice to his younger self would be: “do everything; say yes; don’t stop.”
Bruce joined FloodMapp in May 2021.