Marsh's London office announced that it has appointed Rod Ratsma as managing consultant in its UK Business Continuity Management (BCM) team. " The bulletin notes that he is a "highly respected pioneer in the fields of business continuity and disaster recovery."

He will be responsible for delivering and developing the range of business continuity-related offerings available to Marsh's existing and prospective clients.

Ratsma joins Marsh from Siemens Enterprise Communications, where he was Principal and Head of Continuity Consulting for two years. He has also held director-level positions with SunGard Availability Services, Guardian iT plc and Safetynet Group, where he and his team helped to develop the "BCM Good Practice Guide", which went on to contribute to industry standards, PAS 56 and BS 25999.

Martin Caddick, Leader of the Business Continuity Management team at Marsh noted: "Robust business continuity planning will become more critical as the economic downturn continues into 2009. Companies can use BCM to develop a deeper understanding of their position in the market, their key dependencies and what creates most value to their business.

"Rod's expertise in the business continuity management is extensive, making him ideally placed to offer Marsh's clients a range of continuity-related advisory services that will enable them to take a bolder approach and fight back against these tough market conditions."