Editor’s View: Heads in the sand over ERM?

The technical director of Australian compliance management software company Fast Track, believes that risk-management capability is not keeping pace with the growing complexity of running large organisations.

Gregory Carroll, who has implemented risk-management systems for the Australian Department of Defence, as well as Motorola, Parsons Brinckerhoff and Serco, says that “inadequate systems, outdated risk-management practices, and management with their heads in the sand” are some of the issues faced by many multinationals.

“Most senior executives believe that risk management is at best an evil necessity, at worst a bureaucratic waste of time, but most likely just another failed management fad,” Carroll says. “I believe risk management was over-promised, incorrectly focussed, inconsistently implemented and improperly managed, resulting in it being generally ineffective.”

Carroll believes that “one-size-fits-all assessment programs” do not achieve any useful results. “Risk-assessment must be customised if to be taken seriously, and it must provide meaningful value,” he says. “It also must go through continual review as the risks change. Risk management investments must produce a good return.”

Carroll’s comments come on the eve of a series of webinars that he is presenting next month. In ‘Mastering 21st Century Enterprise Risk Management’, Carroll plans to examine ERM, using specific examples of failed risk management and reviewing the findings of KPMG, actuarial firm Milliman, and the 2013 OpRisk conference.

If you’re interested in finding out what else Carroll has to say on these issues, go to www.fasttrack365.com/risk-talks.

And please drop me a line at sean.mooney@nqsm.com if you want to tell us what you think about the current state of the risk-management landscape.

Yours in risk,

Sean Mooney

Asia editor