He defused bombs in the Balkans, verified Syria’s chemical weapons and now advises boardrooms on the risks that could take them down.

In this episode of The Resilient Edge, Charlie Peschardt speaks with Jerry Smith, OBE – a malicious risk and resilience specialist with over 35 years across the British Army, UK civil service, the UN and the private sector, working in more than 40 countries on four continents.

Jerry traces his path from a reserve SAS selection at 19, through bomb disposal tours in the former Yugoslavia, to serving as senior UN advisor and negotiator leading the verification and removal of Syria’s declared chemical weapons and earning an OBE for services to international arms control. He is now Senior Partner at Blackthorn, a London-based malicious risk management firm where he advises private organisations on security, insurance, and supply-chain resilience.

In this conversation we get into:

● Why Jerry insists his OBE stands for “Other ‘persons’ effort” – and the team behind the Syria chemical weapons mission

● What reserve SAS selection at 19 taught him about resilience and “digging deep”

● The hidden cost of siloed risk management – and the ATM supply chain story that proves it

● Why leaders need SMART objectives as a tool for accountability, not just goal-setting

● The three traits – creativity, flexibility, resilience – Jerry uses to navigate a more volatile, multipolar world

From the conversation

“OBE is other persons’ effort – most people would say it’s a team effort, and it just happens to be the person that’s at the front that gets the thing.” – Jerry

“I’ve had a lot of rejection, which is actually okay. Part of that whole resilience thing is that rejection, as long as it doesn’t kill you, you just have to try and take learning from it.” – Jerry