• SOLUTIONS
    • Quality

      QUALITY

      Quality management solution

      Embed quality throughout your business processes by aligning and centralising all key functions to elevate your organisation to its full potential.

      Find out more

      CASE STUDY

      JAE Oregon take ownership of ISO 9001 and 14001 compliance activities.

      BUSINESS NEEDS

      • APQP
      • ISO & Certifications
      • CAPA management
      • First article inspection report
      • Product part approval process
      • Quality management
      • Supplier management
      • Document management
      • Quality control

      INDUSTRIES

      • Aerospace and defence
      • Life science
      • Manufacturing
      • Healthcare
      • Food and drink
      • Pharmaceuticals
    • Health, safety and environmental

      HEALTH, SAFETY AND ENVIRONMENTAL

      Health, safety and environmental management solutions

      Reduce risk, protect your people and drive sustainability, efficiently and effectively

      Find out more

      CASE STUDY

      News Corp streamline essential workplace training to suit everyone.

      BUSINESS NEEDS

      • Safety management
      • Incident management
      • Health and safety training solution
      • Enviromental

      INDUSTRIES

      • Food and drink
      • Energy
      • Transport and logistics
      • Aviation
    • Audit and risk

      AUDIT AND RISK

      Audit and risk management solutions

      Our powerful audit and risk management solutions help you protect your business, its customers and your corporate clients.

      Find out more

      CASE STUDY

      Cadence Bank integrate audit and risk to create a more powerful system.

      BUSINESS NEEDS

      • Internal audit
      • Risk management
      • External audit tools

      INDUSTRIES

      • Finance
      • Government
      • Education
    • Collaboration

      COLLABORATION

      Collaboration solution

      Bring your people, content and actions together with highly secure, cloud-based collaboration solutions.

      Find out more

      CASE STUDY

      Altera meet CMMI best practices with better control and efficiency.

      BUSINESS NEEDS

      • Bids and proposals
      • Document redaction
      • Document co-authoring and review

      INDUSTRIES

      • Aerospace and defence
      • Life Sciences and pharmaceuticals
      • AEC
    • PRODUCTS
    • Q-Pulse QMS
    • Q-Pulse PM
    • Q-Pulse WorkRite
    • Q-Pulse Law
    • Pentana Audit
    • Pentana Disclose
    • Pentana Risk
    • PleaseReview
    • Coruson
    • Ideagen Academy
    • Huddle
    • Qualtrax
    • InspectionXpert
    • Mi-Co
    • CompliSpace
    • OpsBase
    • Audit Analytics
    • Mail Manager
    • CompliancePath

    FEATURED RESOURCES

    CASE STUDY

    Q-Pulse enabled Anthony Nolan to meet a range of regulations and stay compliant.

    • INDUSTRIES
    • Aerospace and defence
    • Aviation
    • Energy
    • Financial services
    • Healthcare
    • Life science
    • Manufacturing
    • Pharmaceuticals
    • Transport & logistics
    • Food & drinks
    • AEC
    • Government

    FEATURED RESOURCES

    CASE STUDY

    Mettle Ops achieve AS9100 compliance with zero non-conformances.

    CASE STUDY

    NWDC drastically reduces time spent on creating documents.

    • RESOURCES
    • By Industry

      BY INDUSTRY

      • Aerospace and defence
      • Aviation
      • Energy
      • Financial services
      • Healthcare
      • Life science
      • Manufacturing
      • Rail

      FEATURED RESOURCES

      WHITEPAPER

      Manage anti-money laundering regulations in the UK and EU.

      CASE STUDY

      Nuffield Health establish a central database for pathology compliance activities.

    • By Solution

      BY SOLUTION

      • Quality
      • Safety
      • Environmental
      • Regulatory
      • Documents
      • Audit
      • Risk

      FEATURED RESOURCES

      WHITEPAPER

      Manage anti-money laundering regulations in the UK and EU.

      CASE STUDY

      Nuffield Health establish a central database for pathology compliance activities.

    • By Product

      BY PRODUCT

      • Q-Pulse QMS
      • Q-Pulse Law
      • Q-Pulse WorkRite
      • Q-Pulse PM
      • Pentana Audit
      • Pentana Disclose
      • Pentana Risk
      • Pleasereview
      • Coruson
      • Ideagen Academy

      FEATURED RESOURCES

      WHITEPAPER

      Manage anti-money laundering regulations in the UK and EU.

      CASE STUDY

      Nuffield Health establish a central database for pathology compliance activities.

    • By Resource Type

      BY RESOURCE TYPE

      • Brochures
      • Case studies
      • Flyers
      • Blog
      • White papers

      FEATURED RESOURCES

      WHITEPAPER

      Manage anti-money laundering regulations in the UK and EU.

      CASE STUDY

      Nuffield Health establish a central database for pathology compliance activities.

    View All Resources
    • COMPANY
    • About Us

      ABOUT US

      • Our company
      • Leadership team
      • Objectives
      • Strategy
      • Values
      • Our customer focus
      • Certifications
      • Investors

      FEATURED RESOURCES

      CAREERS

      We are recruiting! Take the next exciting step in your career

      VALUES

      We are ambitious - We are adventurous - We are community

    • Events and Updates

      EVENTS AND UPDATES

      • Events
      • News
      • Blogs

      FEATURED RESOURCES

      CAREERS

      We are recruiting! Take the next exciting step in your career

      VALUES

      We are ambitious - We are adventurous - We are community

    • Careers

      CAREERS

      • Careers overview
      • Current vacancies

        HIRING

      • Benefits
      • Apprenticeships
      • Meet our teams

      FEATURED RESOURCES

      CAREERS

      We are recruiting! Take the next exciting step in your career

      VALUES

      We are ambitious - We are adventurous - We are community

  • Contact Sales
Menu
  • Solutions
    • « Back
    • Solutions
    • Quality
      • « Back
      • Quality
      • Quality management solution

        Embed quality throughout your business processes by aligning and centralising all key functions to elevate your organisation to its full potential.

      • Find Out More

      APQP

      CAPA management

      ISO & Certifications

      First article inspection report

      Product part approval process

      Supplier management

      Quality Control

      Quality management

      Document management

      Aerospace and defence

      Life science

      Manufacturing

      Healthcare

      Food and drink

      Pharmaceuticals

      Contact us
    • Health, safety and environmental
      • « Back
      • Health, safety and environmental
      • Health, safety and environmental management solutions

        Reduce risk, protect your people and drive sustainability, efficiently and effectively

      • Find Out More

      Safety management

      Incident management

      Health and safety training solution

      Enviromental

      Food and drink

      Energy

      Transport and logistics

      Aviation

      Contact us
    • Audit & Risk
      • « Back
      • Audit & Risk
      • Audit and risk management solutions

        Our powerful audit and risk management solutions help you protect your business, its customers and your corporate clients.

      • Find out more

      Internal audit

      Risk software

      External audit software

      Finance

      Government

      Education

      Contact us
    • Collaboration
      • « Back
      • Collaboration
      • Collaboration solution

        Bring your people, content and actions together with highly secure, cloud-based collaboration solutions.

      • Find Out More

      Bids and proposals

      Document redaction

      Document co-authoring and review

      Aerospace and defence

      Life Science and Pharmaceuticals

      AEC

      Contact Us
    Contact us
  • Products
    • « Back
    • Products
    • Q-Pulse QMS

      Q-Pulse PM

      Q-Pulse WorkRite

      Q-Pulse Law

      Pentana Audit

      Pentana Disclose

      Pentana Risk

      PleaseReview

      Coruson

      Ideagen Academy

      Audit Analytics

      Mail Manager

      CompliancePath

      Huddle

      Qualtrax

      InspectionXpert

      Mi-Co

      CompliSpace

      OpsBase

    Contact Us
  • Industries
    • « Back
    • Industries
    • Aerospace and defence

      Aviation

      Energy

      Finance

      Healthcare

      Life science

      Manufacturing

      Pharmaceuticals

      Transport & logistics

      Food & drinks

      AEC

      Government

    Contact Us
  • Resources
    • « Back
    • Resources
    • By Industry
      • « Back
      • By Industry
      • Aerospace and defence

        Aviation

        Energy

        Financial services

        Healthcare

        Life science

        Manufacturing

        Rail

      • View all resources
      Contact us
    • By Solution
      • « Back
      • By Solution
      • Quality

        Safety

        Environmental

        Regulatory

        Documents

        Audit

        Risk

      • View all resources
      Contact us
    • By Product
      • « Back
      • By Product
      • Q-Pulse QMS

        Q-Pulse Law

        Q-Pulse WorkRite

        Q-Pulse PM

        Pentana Audit

        Pentana Disclose

        Pentana Risk

        Pleasereview

        Coruson

        Ideagen Academy

      • View all resources
      Contact us
    • By Resource Type
      • « Back
      • By Resource Type
      • Brochures

        Case studies

        Flyers

        Blog

        White papers

      • View all resources
      Contact us
    Contact us
  • Company
    • « Back
    • Company
    • About us
      • « Back
      • About us
      • Our company

        Leadership team

        Objectives

        Strategy

        Values

        Our customer focus

        Certifications

        Investors

      Contact us
    • Events and updates
      • « Back
      • Events and updates
      • Events

        News

        Blogs

      Contact us
    • Careers
      • « Back
      • Careers
      • Careers overview

        Current vacancies

        Benefits

        Apprenticeships

        Meet our teams

      Contact us
    Contact us
Contact Us
  • Home
  • Thought Leadership
  • Blog
  • Critical Capabilities for Operational Risk Management

Critical Capabilities for Operational Risk Management

20 March 2017

glass windows
Critical Capabilities for Operational Risk Management

Share this

Operational risk management is a crucial part of successfully running any organisation.

We live in an era of dramatic, improbable events that adversely affect the economy, the environment, the fate of household name companies and people’s welfare and health. At least, they seem improbable until they happen. Then they can appear inevitable.  Complexity makes them hard to predict: failed banks, industrial accidents, large scale regulatory breaches, corruption and law-breaking, poor governance and corporate collapses. As these calamities pile up on news desks, one begins to realise that situational awareness involves a greater effort than some organisations are capable of and sometimes the battle for control is simply lost. 

To put it aptly: The inability to predict outliers implies the inability to predict the course of history.” - Nassim Nicholas Taleb, The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable

The term operational risk management (ORM) is used by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision to cover risks that are intrinsic to the operation of any business:

  • Internal and external fraud
  • Employee behaviour and workplace safety
  • Market manipulation
  • Product quality problems
  • Fiduciary breaches
  • Asset integrity
  • Business disruption and systems failures
  • Poor governance
  • Process errors

The Basel Committee’s use of the term operational risk is very apt and probably the most useful definition. It can then be understood that enterprise risk management is a strategy that seeks to take a holistic or organisation-wide view of operational risks. For my money, the terms ERM, GRC and integrated risk management are interchangeable as all three imply a global strategy for ORM. 

The risk management journey

It is rare, and arguably unwise, for an organisation to go straight from ad hoc or no risk management to a complete ERM strategy. A more common journey is to move from ad hoc, fragmented systems to a more integrated and agile approach to risk that delivers lean resilience. Thoughtful, managed investment in information management systems is critical. What then are the basics?

According to Gartner, an IT industry analyst, there a number of critical capabilities that need to be taken into consideration for operational risk management. An organisation needs to have the ability to assess and document risks, preferably in a risk register. This is essentially a big list of undesirable events, their potential causes and consequences and the plans to mitigate them. Incident reporting tools that allow staff to raise the alarm at the earliest sign that something is wrong is also important.

In addition, there should be real-time monitoring of lead indicators, response automation tools that execute pre-planned activities when a risk threshold is breached and, lastly, the ability to quantify, analyse and report on risk so that the board and senior management has visibility of their risk exposure today. Are all the lights green? If not, why not?

The application of risk management software

Organisations that take risk seriously make great efforts to model and simulate the what-ifs. They provide staff with easy tools for raising alarms and expressing concerns, they monitor continuously for early warning signs and they are geared up to automatically respond to trouble. If that sounds like a whole different culture from the one you inhabit in your work, it might well be. Should you do something about this? Definitely. 

In the risk management software industry we talk about operational maturity. Just because you’re not aware of a problem doesn’t mean that it isn’t your responsibility. Organisations that invest in operation risk management software do so primarily to protect the public and their own people as well as their finances and reputations from the threat of unforeseen, improbable damaging events. The payoff is that doing so makes them more efficient: safety and efficiency are two sides of the same coin. Anyone who’s ever tripped over in an untidy workshop knows that.

Being proactive about risk means never feeling comfortable again. But then surely that degree of bother is preferable to causing harm and ending up on the front pages or worse?

At Ideagen, we provide robust software solutions for managing and improving operational risk. Our products are designed to evidence governance and compliance while improving your operational processes. Find out more about how our software can take your operational risk management to the next level.

Ideagen's Gordon McKeown
Written by

Gordon Mckeown

Gordon is a software marketing professional with twenty years’ experience in the industry. As Head of Product at Ideagen, Gordon’s job is to understand the needs of our customers and markets, to drive our product strategy.

Find the best product for you

Use our product assistance tool and get recommendations based on your business needs.

My Business Need

This will help us identify the best software product for you.

Please select at least one business need

Tell Us More

Please share some further detail so we can refine your product recommendations.

Please select a type of risk
Previous
Solutions Quality Health, Safety & Environmental Audit & Risk Documents & Collaboration Company Leadership team Our objectives Strategy Investors Careers Vacancies We're hiring
Ideagen products Q-Pulse QMS Q-Pulse WorkRite Q-Pulse PM Q-Pulse Law Pentana Audit Pentana Disclose Pentana Risk PleaseReview Coruson Ideagen Academy Ideagen Academy CompliancePath Huddle Qualtrax Mi-Co InspectionXpert CompliSpace OpsBase Mail Manager Audit Analytics
Pentana Disclose Pentana Risk PleaseReview Coruson Ideagen Academy CompliancePath Huddle Qualtrax Mi-Co InspectionXpert CompliSpace OpsBase Mail Manager Audit Analytics
Company Leadership team Our objectives Strategy Investors Careers Vacancies We're hiring
Connect with us
© Ideagen Plc.
Privacy Policy Terms and conditions GDPR commitment Environmental policy Slavery and human traficking statement Sitemap