‘Lean’ is a buzzword in software development describing an approach where you conduct lots of short, fast experiments and iterate depending on the outcome. ‘Lean’ also conjure up images of a racehorse or athlete. Fit, powerful and ready for peak performance. ‘Lean’ can also means stripped of anything superfluous and free of frills. Your risk assessment process needs to include elements of all of these. Your need a lean risk assessment process. ...

There are lots of reasons you might be looking for risk management software but there’s one thing that everyone wants. More time. DCDR doesn’t have a time-travel module but the app does help you get back time. A lot of time, in fact. Time that you’d otherwise spend entering data, formatting reports and creating graphs and charts. **However, we also noticed that people often don’t even have the time to get set up on the system in the first place. ** ...

Your biggest risks aren’t usually the ones staring you in the face The big ticket items – the ones that are at the top of everyone’s list, the first thing the CEO wants to talk about – aren’t usually the biggest risk you’re facing. These might be the biggest threats. These might reflect everyone’s biggest fear. But because these are so well known. Because these get so much attention, you’re probably spending a lot of time and effort on these risks. The result is thatthese are closely monitored, well mitigated and heavily managed so the resultant risk is relatively benign. ...

It was the highpoint of a recent meeting with a large firm’s corporate security team. While we were showing them around DCDR, the CSO leaned over to a colleague and said “I love the simplicity“. Cue smiles from our side…. Our intent was always to make the best piece of risk management software possible and a key part of that was to keep things simple. However, as time goes on, it’s easy to lose sight of the original concept, to add ‘just one more feature’ and eventually end up with a Frankenstein’s monster which looks nothing like your original idea (and that everybody hates). ...

Failure is not Definitely an Option People agree that starting a business is risky and although the failure rates might not be as dire as people like to say, 20% fail in their first year and only 50% make it to five years. A decade in, only 30% are still around (Stats courtesy of Fundera.). A tech startup takes that to a whole new level because of the additional layers of uncertainty that technology imposes. Startup’s risks are significant. ...

Conducting a risk assessment is a big project and, like any big project, there are a lot of things between you and success. However, there are five common risk assessment problems that crop up time and time again. These make the difference between success and failure no matter what else you do. Keep these five problems in mind and plan accordingly to maximize the chances of success with your next risk assessment. ...

I received an email a while back from someone just making their start in risk management asking if I had any thoughts or advice on the risk management skills they needed. The response quickly became several pages long and I thought it was worth turning it into a blog piece that others might benefit from. This could also be titled ‘Letter to a 30-year old me’ or a 40-year old me.. ...

In some ways, all risks can be considered subjective for two reasons. Firstly, how we perceive risks is a very personal matter based on in-built biases, the experiences we have had and our current situation. An example from a well-known risk textbook is an icy sidewalk. A child might see that as a fun thing to slide on so their perception is that there is no risk. A retiree will perceive this as a high risk as their chance of falling and becoming injured is higher and more debilitating. If a kid falls, they usually just get up and carry on with what they are doing. ...

Two major events are going to happen in US within the five years. One is a replay of the US subprime mortgage collapse which spawned the 2008 financial crisis. The other will occur when the bubble of college debt bursts. Both events – one of which may well trigger the other – will cause massive strain on US banks with potential global repercussions. This isn’t a bold claim. There are lots of people, all of whom much more familiar with this kind of risk than I am, sounding similar alarm bells. For example, the day after I started writing this, the Financial Times’ editorial was on a similar topic. And there may be other significant events that occur in addition to these but making forecasts about what’s going to happen isn’t the point of this article. ...

Happy September! I’m a big fan of September for several reasons: the weather is cooling down, vacation-time is over, fall race season is starting (well, it is normally) and there’s a lot of pie-ready fruit available (I love pie). However, one reason I really like this month is that September is a great month for getting things done. And if you have any plans to build or update your enterprise risk management system by the end of the year, this might be your last chance to get started.** ** ...