ISO31000 - Risk Management Principles

Risk management creates and protects value.

Risk management contributes to the demonstrable achievement of objectives and improvement of performance in, for example, human health and safety, security, legal and regulatory compliance, public acceptance, environmental protection, product quality, project management, efficiency in operations, governance and reputation.

Risk management is an integral part of all organizational processes.

Risk management is not a stand-alone activity that is separate from the main activities and processes of the organization. Risk management is part of the responsibilities of management and an integral part of all organizational processes, including strategic planning and all project and change management processes.

Risk management is part of decision making.

Risk management helps decision makers make informed choices, prioritize actions and distinguish among alternative courses of action.

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Five principles for creating a strategy-focused organization

Principle 1: Translate the strategy into operational terms

This principle comprises two sub-components: Strategy Maps and Balanced Scorecards that together describe the strategy and its implementation. It is by translating strategy into the logical architecture of a Strategy Map and a Balanced Scorecard that organizations create a common, understandable point of reference for everyone.

Principle 2: Align the organization to the strategy

Synergy is the overarching goal of organization design. Organizations consist of numerous sectors, business units and specialized departments, each with its own strategy. For organizational performance to become

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Webinar - Integrating Risk Into Your Balanced Scorecard - 27th Sept

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Join Andrew Smart, the CEO of StratexSystems, as he presents a one-hour webinar on integrating Risk into Your Balanced Scorecard. He will explain the important role a Balanced Scorecard has to play in a risk management framework, how to use the Balanced Scorecard to set the context for your risk management initiative and how create alignment within your organisational culture through risk appetite, accountabilities and alignment matrix.

To effectively Integrate Risk into Your Balanced Scorecard, technology is critical. Andrew will demonstrate how your organisation can take advantage of its SharePoint investment to deliver an Integrated Risk into Your Balanced Scorecard.

Register here

Webinar - Shaping Your Culture Via Risk Appetite - 18th Oct

Join Andrew Smart, the CEO of StratexSystems, as he presents a one-hour webinar on Shaping Your Organisational Culture via Risk Appetite. He will explain briefly explain risk appetite and how it can be linked into the overall strategy and risk management process of an organisation. He will then go on to explain how Risk Appetite statements work alongside Vision statements, creating the right ‘tone from the top’, and how that can be cascaded through the organisation in the form of Risk Tolerances and KRIs.

The webinar will conclude with a demonstration of how to enable and embed change leveraging your SharePoint investment.

Register here

Webinar - Managing With KPIs & KRIs - 1st Nov

Join Andrew Smart, the CEO of StratexSystems, as he presents a one-hour webinar on Managing with KPIs and KRIs. During this webinar He will explain the how to incorporate KPIs and KRIs into a integrated Strategy Execution and Risk Management framework, he will explain how to use these different types of indicators together in a Strategy Map to develop a forward looking view of strategy and risk, and he will outline why using a RAGAR approach for monitoring indicator status is preferable to a traditional RAG approach.

The webinar will conclude with a practical demonstration of how organisation can leverage their investment in SharePoint to effective roll-out KPIs and KRIs across their organisation.

Register here

What is SharePoint?

Many people will be familiar with SharePoint as a place to store their documents and as their internet site, maybe providing a team or project with a specific workspace to enable collaboration. For many organisations delivering internet sites and document management is SharePoint’s role, however this underrates, and risks underutilising SharePoint.

As the diagram below shows, SharePoint is

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Banks 20 years behind in risk management…

Since we started developing the Risk-Based Performance Management approach, back in late 2006/07, we have been consistently saying that the way the financial services sector manages both strategy execution and risk management needs to be improved.

Now Corven Consulting has released a research report that found Banks are 20 years behind the aviation industry in managing risk. This finding and other key points from the report, below simply reinforce our belief that there is significant room for improvement in strategy execution and risk management.

Key points from the report are, based on 60% of the

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One of the UK's newest banks has chosen StratexPoint to help grow its business

StratexSystems' latest software solution, StratexPoint, will play a key role in ensuring the successful growth and development of Aldermore Bank, a relative newcomer to the UK financial services industry.

Aldermore's Chief Risk Officer, Steve Barry, says, “As a relatively new business we recognise that we need to continually invest and develop and we believe that by employing the StratexSystems product, StratexPoint, we will be able to improve the quality of our risk management processes which in turn will support the rest of the business in achieving our long term objectives. This product will take us from a simple automation process to an integration of strategy and risk – both of which are essential to the success of any business.”

StratexPoint is powered by Microsoft's SharePoint technology and is unique in its ability to integrate strategy execution and risk management into one tool. The product enables businesses to improve the quality, accuracy and timeliness of their information and processes in order to support the execution of strategy and management of risk throughout the business.

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Job: PR/Marketing Executive

A fantastic, challenging and varied role has arisen for a high energy, hard working and creative PR/Marketing executive to join us to drive our PR/Marketing activities, lift our profile/brand and to develop and execute the PR/Marketing strategy for a fast growing technology company.

In this role you will be working directly for the CEO and will have a large amount of freedom to undertake PR/Marketing activities, all of which should be focused on developing our profile/brand and driving leads for our sales teams. 
There will be a strong focus on social media to build a community of followers and supporters online, using blogs, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn etc. There will also be a range of more traditional activities, particularly organising campaigns and events, ensuring leads data is maintained in a CRM system and building relationships with key journalists, bloggers and other influencers in our space.

The ideal candidate will have the following profile:

  •    Be able to demonstrate experience with b2b social networks/blogging
  •    Have experience in the technology and/or financial services industry
  •    Have experience/background as a journalist
  •    Have a formal PR/Marketing/Journalist related qualification
  •    Have Adobe Suite (Photoshop, Indesign etc.) and video editing experience 

This is a varied role and one that offers the successful candidate a range of opportunities for developing their career, skills and capabilities and to take on more responsibilities in the future.

Salary will depend on experience and expertise. This position will be based in Waterloo, London.

Please contact rebecca.beard@stratexsystems.com with your CV and short covering letter.

More than 50% of Fines Issued by the FSA are as a Result of Weak Risk Management Systems

Research from the Chartered Institute of Internal Auditors has revealed that more than half of the fines handed out by the Financial Services Authority (FSA) in 2011 were as a result of weak internal risk management systems. 

Fines can be issued by the FSA when organisations breach any of the eleven principles (operational and ethical). The recent research announced by the Chartered Institute of Internal Auditors, shows that 60% of the FSA’s fines in 2011 were as a result of weak risk management systems – in 2010, 55% of fines were levied as a result of this.

Dr Ian Peters, Chief Executive of the Chartered Institute of Internal Auditors says:

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