IRM Global Risk Awards 2013

We were invited to attend the IRM Global Risk Awards at the The Grand Connaught Rooms in London.

StratexSystems was one of the finalists for the IRM Global Risk Awards in the category of "Risk Management Service Provider of the Year".

List of a few Winners: 

Delivering value through risk management

Winner: Balfour Beatty Fleet Services – UK

Managing risk across boundaries

Winner: TRIDEC Project – Germany

Innovation through technology

Winner: Scottish Power and Amor Group – UK

Highly commended: London Borough of Ealing – UK

Risk management solution of the year

Winner: Zurich Risk Room – Switzerland

Highly commended: Active Risk Group – UK / International

Excellence in the face of adversity

Winner: KA Goalkeeping UK – UK

Building risk management capability

Joint winner: Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) – Dubai

Joint winner:  Intel – USA

​Pictures of the night below!

Webinar Download: 'How to deliver an effective, robust risk framework while responding to regulatory action'

Following Part Two of our How To Webinar Series, please download/stream the recorded webinar, free of charge, by visiting: http://www.screencast.com/t/4nxvomaas72B

To register for Part Three ‘How to Lower your Operational Losses via improved Risk Management’ and/or Part Four ‘How To Leverage SharePoint for Risk Management’ visit: http://www.stratexsystems.com/how-to-series/

By registering, you will automatically receive a downloadable/stream-friendly version of the webinar, as well as access to the live session.

Process Governance – Bridging the Gap between Strategy and Operation

Process management involves monitoring and managing the performance of, and risks and controls related to, operational processes to ensure the delivery of the strategy while operating within risk appetite.

By focusing on process management, organisations can improve their operational efficiency, become more innovative and respond with greater agility to the needs of the market. There is also evidence that process-managed enterprises are highly effective at cutting costs across the value chain.

From an operational point of view, many organisations have adopted process improvement methodologies such as Six Sigma and LEAN.

StratexPoint is the only SharePoint application which enables organisations to close the gap between strategy and operations by integrating process management within a performance and risk management solution. Within the solution, users can:

· Define their key operational processes and visualise these using Microsoft Visio

· Define risks and controls related to processes

· Conduct process related risk and control assessments

· Define indictors for processes

· Align initiatives and actions to drive process improvements

· Define accountability for processes using the RACI model

· Automated process and systems related risk and controls dashboards and reporting, while enabling advanced analytics

· Encourage a collaborative approach to executing processes via commentary, alerts and other web 2.0 collaboration capabilities

· Automated risk and controls dashboards and reporting, while enabling advanced analytics

The Four Approaches to Integrating Risk Management and the Balanced Scorecard

 

StratexSystems’ Microsoft SharePoint™ based Enterprise Risk Management solution is unique. While other risk management software offers part of the solution, StratexSystems has developed a complete solution; integrating performance management and risk management into a comprehensive software solution.

StratexSystems used the strategic management system of the balanced scorecard, alongside COSO BS31100, ISO31000 and ISO31010 framework to create a Microsoft Certified Risk-Based Performance management software solution – StratexPoint.

The approach we take focuses on clarifying the organisational objectives and the level of risk (Appetite) required to achieve those objectives. Using Microsoft’s SharePoint™, we have produced a user-friendly, enterprise-wide, technology solution that allows risk taking to be monitored and optimised on a day-to-day basis.

StratexSystems understands that in order to keep tabs on strategy management, enterprise risk management (ERM) and enterprise performance management (EPM), the software solution must be integrated using conceptually sound methodology, and suited to every user.

When considering risk management, organisations often deliberate the following questions: How important is the Balanced Scorecard in business? How important is Enterprise Risk Management in business? How does the integration make a difference?

In a series of blogs, three often talked about approaches to integrating risk management and the balanced scorecard (the Theme Approach, the Perspective Approach and the Indicator Approach) are considered and evaluated, before introducing StratexSystems’ Appetite Approach.

  1. The Theme Approach looks at the pros and cons of simply adding a Risk Strategic Theme to the existing Balanced Scorecard.
  2. The Perspective Approach considers why adding a Risk Perspective to an organisation’s Balanced Scorecard is not enough.
  3. The Indicator Approach evaluates the most common approach to integration, in which key risk indicators (KRIs) are added to each objective alongside existing key performance indicators (KPIs). The blog on this approach explains why it is a sub-optimal business solution.
  4. The innovative Appetite Approach brings together strategy, performance and risk management, to form a ‘Risk Appetite’. This blog entry considers why this approach offers the most comprehensive business solution.

To read more thoughts on the four approaches to integrating Risk Management and the Balanced Scorecard, and to complete our survey about your organisation’s employment of various Risk Processes and Solutions, please visit www.riskbasedperformance.com

Follow us on twitter for regular updates www.twitter.com/StratexSystems

Growing Importance of Operational Risk Management

Alongside the growth of Enterprise Risk Management, Operational Risk Management is a disciple which has emerged and raised up the management agenda as a result of operational and regulatory pressure. Basel 2 brought operational risk management to the forefront of the risk management agenda prior to the credit crunch. In the wake of the crisis, there is a renewed emphasis in operational risk management as organisations look to reduce operational losses and establish a 'no surprises' environment.

Operational Risk is all about the risk related to processes, systems and people. Managing these risks has the potential to create significant value for organisations, with operational losses often a costly item for many organisations. Additionally organisations are often forced to allocate capital to these risks by regulation. Therefore reducing the level of risk frees up capital for income generating activities.

Coupled with the implementation of a new risk management framework, significant business benefits are emerging.

· Defining key and emerging risks and map these using a risk map

· Defining processes and systems, and their related risks and controls

· Defining a set of Key Indicators, KPIs, KRIs and KCIs

· Assessing risks and controls related to the processes and systems

· Defining accountability for risks and controls to individuals

· Automating process and systems related risk and controls dashboards and reporting, while enabling advanced analytics

· Encouraging a collaborative approach to delivering performance via commentary, alerts and other web 2.0 collaboration capabilities 

The Evolution of Enterprise Risk Management

In the wake of the credit crunch, Enterprise Risk Management has quickly found its way to the very top of many management teams agendas. Regulators, both within the financial services industry and outside this industry, are also taking an increasing interest in Enterprise Risk Management in the firms they are regulating.

The disciple of Enterprise Risk Management has often evolved through published standards, starting with the COSO frameworks in the early 1990s through to more recent standards such as BS31100, ISO31000 and ISO31010.

In the post credit crunch environment, many organisations are recognising the role risk plays in the creation of value, and if left unchecked, value destruction. In our current environment, Enterprise Risk Management must be placed at the heart of an organisation's strategic execution process.