Risk management process is identifying, evaluating, and controlling threats to an organization's capital and profits. These risks stem from a variety of sources, including financial insecurity, legal liability, technical issues, strategic mismanagement, accidents and natural disasters.
Risk management also examines the relationship between risk and its wider impact on the strategic objectives of an organization.
This holistic approach to risk management is sometimes referred to as enterprise risk management because of its emphasis on predicting and understanding risk across the organization. In addition to focusing on internal and external threats, enterprise risk management (ERM) emphasizes the importance of positive risk management.
Positive risks are opportunities that can add business value or, conversely, harm an organization if not seized. In fact, the goal of any risk management program is not to eliminate all risk, but to preserve and increase the value of the organization by making informed risk decisions.
Why is risk management important?
Risk management has probably never been more important than it is today. Rapid globalization has made the risks facing modern organizations more complex. New risks are emerging all the time, often related to and caused by the use of current prevailing digital technologies.
As the world grapples with COVID-19, companies and their boards of directors are rethinking their risk management programs. They re-evaluate their risk exposure and examine risk processes. Companies currently taking a passive approach to risk management, protecting against past risks and changing practices when new risks harm them, consider the competitive advantages of a more proactive approach.
There is a growing interest in supporting business sustainability, resilience and agility. Organizations are also exploring how artificial intelligence technology and sophisticated governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) platforms can improve risk management.