Practical
experience 

Conceptual
​thinking 

Harmattan Risk was established in London in 2006 by Robert McKellar. Robert holds an MA in Political Science from Canada, with emphasis on instability and terrorism, and a Master of International Business from France with a focus on emerging market entry and operations. He also studied Arabic in Tunis for a year. Robert held senior consultant positions in both international strategic marketing and risk consulting firms before establishing Harmattan Risk. He has conducted project work on the ground in North Africa, the Middle East, and Afghanistan, and has briefly worked in other developing regions. His consulting experience has focused mainly on the private sector but he has also worked with NGOs and donor organisations, and he obtained some insightful experience in the government perspective on socio-political risk through roles in security sector reform projects in post-conflict environments.

Robert is author of A Short Guide to Political Risk (Routledge, 2010) and the political risk chapter in The Risk Management Handbook (ed. David Hillson, Kogan Page, 2016, with a second edition coming out in 2023). He also wrote the forthcoming book, Political Risk Intelligence for Business Operations in Complex Environments, to be published by Taylor & Francis in 2023.
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Harmattan’s immediate network includes experienced experts in emerging market country and regional intelligence, overseas security, corporate social responsibility, and Middle East market entry.
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Harmattan Risk Data Privacy Policy, 2018 

Harmattan Risk is the sole proprietorship trading name for Robert McKellar, based in London, United Kingdom. This section sets out Harmattan Risk’s privacy policy.

Harmattan Risk's website is built on Weebly, a website creation and hosting service based in the USA. Weebly websites contain cookies to enable or track functionality and to gather statistics on visits to Weebly sites. Weebly's privacy policy can be found at https://www.weebly.com/uk/privacy. Through settings in most browsers it is possible to turn off or opt out of cookies. 

Weebly provides Harmattan Risk with top level statistics on site visit trends, including any referring websites, but does not provide Harmattan Risk with any indication of specific site visitor profiles nor site visitor IP addresses. 

From time to time Harmattan Risk might email specific individuals identified in open source market research or by personal referral, to suggest a commercial discussion, or to request a discussion for project research purposes. Recipients can request that Harmattan Risk does not initiate email communication in the future and that addresses are deleted. Harmattan Risk does not share email nor other communications addresses with any third party. Contact information and un-deleted past communications are stored on our communication service providers’ own systems for as long as they might be relevant to future reference or use. While Harmattan Risk uses well established communication service providers, Harmattan Risk is not responsible for the security of their systems. For ordinary and day to day purposes, email is not encrypted.

From time to time Harmattan Risk might send letters by post to specific individuals in companies identified as having a potential need for or interest in Harmattan Risk services. Individuals in relevant roles or functions, and contact information, are sourced from a combination of company websites, industry news and professional networking sites. For our internal purposes, contact information as well as a brief company profile, including a brief assessment of potential interest in Harmattan Risk services, are retained in a digital file. This information is not shared with any third parties. Should the recipient of a letter wish to receive no further communication from Harmattan Risk, they can email Harmattan Risk and a notation in the file will be made to this effect. 

In client project work, the specific mode of communication and data exchange most appropriate to the sensitivity of the project will be specified in client discussions prior to project commencement, and will vary depending on specific agreement. Harmattan Risk utilises up to date and reasonably comprehensive computer security on a day to day basis, but specific security protocols can also be adjusted to suit the sensitivity of specific projects. In cases in which Harmattan Risk works with associates or external providers, whether or not, or to what extent, such elements of a project team will be included in client communications and given access to client information will be discussed and agreed with the client prior to project commencement. Except for instances wherein the client agrees to include external project associates in communication and data exchange for a specific project, Harmattan Risk does not share client communication or information with any third parties, and only shares the names of client organisations if agreed with the client for specific purposes. 

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