risk (579)

Understanding Risk

There's a lot of nonsense about risk and complexity at the moment, notwithstanding the good work by a few people.

Let's remember that at the heart of things there are people, experts, stakeholders, employees and communities. Everybody shares a little bit of information about what has happened, what will happen, what we need to watch out for, and for any given situation, what we need is a multi-level open discussion with everybody involved. The conversation needs to be a structured, balanced, coll
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On the surface at least, it’s hard to take away positives in the wake of the financial crisis. Yes, it taught us that we have to manage risk better, improve processes and become more transparent. But it’s the regulators globally that seem to have taken these lessons closely to heart.


With some banks still struggling to conform to Basel II requirements, Basel III is being hotly debated. It will force banks to hold more capital, and many argue that this will bring the end of ‘cheap money’. In the U

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Brand Building of Risk Management Department

"Your brand is created out of customer contact and the experience your customers have of you" - Stelios Haji-Ioannou, Chairman, EasyGroup

The risk management departments are sometimes perceived in negative light due to their role in the organization. The business operation teams view the risk management departments as office police, watch dogs, critics and messengers of bad news. The basic job function of the risk management departments is to:

  1. Conduct audits and reviews of business operations and
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When your Parachute Doesn't Open

Do you have a plan for what to do when your parachute doesn’t open?


Well, if you do not, pay attention. Here is a 6 step checklist for what to do:

  1. Signal your Buddy.
  2. Get close with your Buddy.
  3. Link your arms through his/her straps.
  4. Open his/her chute.
  5. Let your Buddy steer the chute.
  6. Suggest that he/she look for an extra soft place to land (water).

There now. Don’t you feel safer?


You say you do not parachute jump? So what good it this?


Well, you must see that this is really good advice that can be applied

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Getting Real About Reputation Risk

Why should organizations be concerned about Reputation Risk?


As the world become more and more networked, more and more companies are exposed to a changing set of vulnerabilities. The landscape of risk has changed. No longer can any country or organization ignore the
happenings of 911, Bali and London.


In this new world, incidents can damage a good reputation purely because an organization can take too long to act decisively with problems. For instance a reputation damaging incident can become inte

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A company was fined a heavy penalty the other day for a a workplace accident that was caused by the company managers condoning illegal actions, because that is the "way we have always done it in the
past".

In this case an unlicensed driver of a forklift caused an accident.

The company decided to plead guilty being negligent in terms of the Occupational Health & Safety Act, expecting a thousand rand (ZAR) fine, but thecourt decided a fine of R10000 would be more appropriate. The judge's words: " Do
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In the automotive dealership space I have seen acquisitions turn into legal tribulations when after a deal is closed personnel related non-compliance issues pop-up creating huge, multi-million dollar headaches literally days after deal close.

What was found was a fundamental disregard for the human element in the valuation of a business...what have the people been up to that reinforces the business processes that helped make the business successful as well as what they have been doing on their ow
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VaR: friend or foe?


For many risk managers, the recent financial meltdown has left them questioning the veryessence of risk modeling, used by many since the 1990s to measure their firm’sfinancial risk. Investment firms have traditionally relied on fantasticallycomplex mathematical models for measuring the associated risk in their variousportfolios, primarily to reassure investors that all is well. However, theworldwide events of the past 18 months have, arguably, left the reputation of riskmodeling in tatters. Here

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Most of Europe's biggest banks comfortably passed the Committeeof European Banking Supervisors’ recentstress tests and the sector has breathed a visible sigh of relief. However,plenty of uncertainty remains over banks that either squeaked by with justenough capital or passed but did not fully disclose the data that went intotheir calculations. The spectre of counterparty risk, last seen in dramaticform in the wake of the Lehman collapse, is not far from regulators’ andinvestors’ minds amid the c

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Definitions create the lenses through which we look at the world. The renowned psychologist, Abraham Maslow said that if the only thing you have is a hammer, you tend to treat everything as a nail.

I start every seminar and presentation with definitions, sothat I can establish a common framework through which I can work with my audience. In particular there are a number of definitions to describe reputation and reputation risk, each serving a slightly different purpose.

These need to be further e
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Many companies navigate the routine complexity of business with adequate or acceptable managem

Team Sport

Team Sport

ent, however it is the truly stellar company/s that excel not only on a routine basis but especially in times of crisis. It is select skills, experience and traits that are able to applied during times of critical decision-making that separate them from the herd. Specific skills and attributes are not something that can be learnt in the minutes and seconds required in order to apply to a criti

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Business and IT staff at Europe's financial institutions want more emphasis placed on risk management, with just a quarter confident that their existing IT systems are capable of using stored data to provide a full analysis across all business units, according to research commissioned by Oracle.


The survey of 228 business professionals and 222 IT staff in financial institutions across Europe, conducted by Vanson Bourne, indicates that existing IT systems are unable to deliver what businesses
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Bad weather or even natural calamities do not affect every city in the world nor every resident of the affected area. Accidents, an inevitable part of some environments, do not affect all your people or totally devalue all your assets. Terrorist do not consider everyone a viable target nor are their actions likely to impact everyone over the course of their lives. The facts remain that only a small percentage of events or incidents resulting in loss of value or productivity will affect your busi

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Note: This was posted on my blog a couple of months ago, but I just joined here, and I think the message still applies...

The Issue

If you've heard me speak at a conference oranother event recently, you likely heard me say that in many important areas no one can predict the future.
So if you don't know whatwill happen, how can you prepare for it? The solution to this dilemma is that you don't have to predict future events in order to prepare for them.
We have a recent example with the Eyjafjallajo
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Social media guidance

Please find below links to interesting policy documents related to Social Media. These links have been compiled by Hilmar Nierop who kindly granted his permission to distribute them for your use.

These documents have informational value for all users of social media in various countries with their distinctive legal and communications culture. After all, the global use of social media has such an impact that it provides an international substance which reigns over local legal form(s), rules and r
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