Risk Management Roadmap – Succeeding where Others Don’t

More than half of the country’s coal mines are managed by pro-Russian separatist militia.

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Say you were starting out to introduce Risk Management in your organisation, (leave aside what has been done up till now), and you put together the operational risk frameworks and implementation plans to achieve certain objectives in (say) 3 years.

Now pretend it is that 3-years’ time. Ask yourself the question, if I took what I knew now after these years, and was back at the start where I am now, would I have undertaken Risk Management differently?

The answer would likely be “Yes”.

It is much better to know all the steps of the journey at the start, and decide which ones to do earlier and others to introduce later, than having incomplete knowledge and finding this out later.

In setting a Risk Management Maturity Roadmap, you set where you want to be (i.e. achieve) in say 3-years’ time. Then you work backwards in 6-monthly increments and decide what the maturity steps will be, starting from Day 1.

Seek input from a SME to assist you have a well-designed Risk Management Maturity Roadmap that ensures that you understand the options faced at the time when incorporating more aspects into Risk Management, in particular to avoid rework that would otherwise occur.

By implication, you start with the simpler methods and build sophistication over time, in ways that staff find intuitive and agree to buy into.

Risk Management has a wide application and at its core, is used to make more informed and better decisions at all levels.

Framework and Policies are important documents that describe how your organisation intends to conduct its risk management programs.

In the preceding articles, the author described that one of the initial tasks is to review risk frameworks and policies Preparing for Enterprise Risk Management - a World of Difference

This documentation is the foundation for value adding Risk Management, involving top management and building a Risk Management team with the right competencies to support the implementation phase.

At this time Mining houses would mostly have risk management established in some form or other. The question is whether the risk management is adequate and so becomes a matter of optimisation.

In the same vein one can ask:

When was risk management last reviewed?

Longer than 2 years suggests it is overdue.

Was the review done in-house?

If yes, it suggests the changes may have been minimal; it is unlikely to do much.

Is risk management weighted to safety?

If yes, it suggests you lack Risk Management.

Was the review outsourced to a consultant?

If yes, does the consultant have core expertise in implementation of risk management?

If No, find the right consultant.