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Risk Management—From Adversity to Advantage
How market dynamics are forcing a different approach to risk management.
by Bill Curtis

August 31, 2005

Risk is a powerful motivator for all of us. Failure to manage risk properly can result in unprecedented professional and personal loss—from increased customer turnover and lost business partners, to heavy legal penalties, missed market or revenue opportunities, and in the worst cases, a complete loss of business operations.

With that in mind, many enterprises, and IT teams specifically, are looking to implement sophisticated risk-mitigation strategies that will allow them to better understand and more effectively manage the risks they face—whether the risks arise out of technology decisions, compliance mandates, or changes in business strategy. According to recent survey data from Forrester Research, 62 percent of chief information officers (CIOs) already have company-wide initiatives focused on enterprise risk and compliance management.

While the role of risk management is becoming more and more critical in an accelerated and geographically dispersed business environment, risk management itself is not a new discipline. The traditional risk-management strategies that many CIOs are implementing today have been around for decades and typically focus on controlling risks to minimize loss or failure.

Going forward, enterprises need to expand their view of risk management to encompass the concept of risk as a business enabler. This new perspective defines risk not only as a threat, but as an opportunity that can be leveraged to create new products, new services, new business models, and new ways to compete in the marketplace. Today, successful enterprises are building strategies that balance risk management with risk taking to increase innovation, advance operational excellence, and achieve market advantage.