-r-------- .._. ._. ._.:,.....-... MEETING THE FUTURE: DYNAMIC RISK MANAGEMENT FOR UNCERTAIN TIMES Beyond the profound health and economic uncertainty of our current moment, catastrophic events are expected to occur more frequently in the future. The digital revolution, climate change. stakeholder expectations, and geopolitical risk will play major roles. The digital revolution has increased the availability of data, degree of connectivity, and speed at which decisions are made. Those changes offer transformational promise but also come with the potential for largeescale failure and security breaches. together with a rapid cascading of consequences. At the same time, fueled by digital connectivity and social media, reputational damage can spark and spread quickly. The changing climate presents massive structural shifts to companies' riske return profiles, which will accelerate in a nonlinear fashion. Companies need to navigate concerns for their immediate bottom lines along with pressures from governments, investors, and society at large. All that, and natural disasters, too, are growing more frequent and severe. Stakeholder expectations for corporate behaviour are higher than ever. Firms are expected to act lawfully but also with a sense of social responsibility. Consumers expect companies to take a stand on social issues, such as those fueling the #MeToo and Black Lives Matter movements. Employees are increasingly vocal about company policies and actions. Regulator and government attention is reflecting societal concerns in areas ranging from data privacy to climate. An uncertain geopolitical future provides the backdrop for such pressures. The world is more interconnected than ever before, from supply chains to travel to the flow of information. But those ties are under threat, and most companies have not designed robust roles within the global system that would allow them to keep functioning smoothly if connections were abruptly cut. Companies require dynamic and flexible risk management to navigate an unpredictable future in which change comes quickly. The level of riskemanagement maturity varies across industries and across companies. In general, banks have the most mature approach, followed by companies in industries in which safety is paramount, including oil and gas. advanced manufacturing, and pharmaceuticals. However, we believe that nearly all organizations need to refresh and strengthen their approach to risk management to be better prepared forthe next normal. The following discussion describes the core of dynamic risk management and outlines actions companies can take to build it. In orderto meet the needs of the futu re, companies need to elevate risk management from mere prevention and mitigation to dynamic strategic enablement and value creation. This requires clear objectives, such as ensuring that efforts are focused on the risks that matter most, providing clarity about risk levels and risk appetite in a way that facilitates effective business decisions, and making sure that the organization is prepared to manage risks and adverse events. In practice, risk managers should engage in a productive dialogue with business leaders to gain an inedepth understanding of how the business thinks about risk day to day and to share the risk capabilities they can bring. Businesses typically approach decisions with a reasonable riskeversusereturn mindset but lack key information to do this effectively alone. For example, business units often do not have a full systematic understanding of the full range of risk drivers or a clear view of how a stressed environment could affect the company. More broadly, businesses typically also lack an enterpriseewide view of how a risk might unfold. For example, climate risk may affect most aspects of some companies' businesses, from the impact of physical climate risk on operational facilities and supply chains to market repricing of carbon emissions to shifts in market demand and competitive landscape. The COVlD-19 pandemic has had a similarly crosseenterprise impact on nearly every company. It should be an objective of dynamic risk management to provide an enterprise view. The increasingly volatile, uncertain, and dynamic risk environment will demand more agile risk management. Companies will need to tap into people with the right skills and knowledge in real time, convening crossfunctional teams and authorizing them to make rapid decisions in running the business, innovating, and managing risk. Companies can embrace the digital revolution to improve risk management. Automation technologies can digitise transaction workflows end to end, reducing human error. Rich data streams from traditional sources, such as ratings agencies, and nontraditional sources, such as social media. provide an expanding and increasingly granular view of risk characteristics. Sophisticated algorithms enable better error detection, more accurate predictions, and microlevel segmentation. One global pharmaceutical company adopted advanced analytics to help it prioritize clinicaletrial sites for quality audits. The company used a model to identify higherrisk sites and the specific type of risk most likely to occur at each site. The company is now tightly integrating its analytics with its core risk-management processes, including risk-remediation and monitoring activities of its clinical operations and quality teams. The new approach identifies issues that would have gone undetected under its old manual process while also freeing 30 percent of its quality resources. The world is facing both uncertainty and rapid change. For companies, risk levels are rising as are the expectations of employees, customers, shareholders, governments, and society at large. Against this backdrop, we believe companies need to rethink their approach to risk management, to make it a dynamic source of competitive advantage. Question 2 (25 Marks) As highlighted in the case study, the level of riskmanagement maturity varies across industries and across companies. In general, banks have the most mature approach, followed by companies in industries in which safety is paramount, including oil and gas, advanced manufacturing, and pharmaceuticals. Comment on this statement and review why banks are considered to have the most mature approach. Your response should make use of relevant examples