BP found its “Company Killer”: Do you know yours?

Time will tell if the Gulf of Mexico oil spill will kill BP or just severely cripple it, but whatever the case I’ll bet they didn’t see it coming!  Will you?

It looks like this spill will be (if it isn’t already) the biggest man-made disaster ever.  The extent of the spill, the scope of damage and the resulting impacts on the environment, marine life, economies, and people remains to be seen, but catastrophic sums it up.  BP and all of the other world’s oil companies plan for spills.  They build complex risk models, examine alternative worst case scenarios, look at maximum probable losses, and they are generally very good at measuring and managing risk.  But what if the worst case scenario that you imagined turns out to be wrong?

In BP’s risk modeling they would have factored in the US government’s cap on environmental clean-up and damages at $75 Million.  Did they predict that the government would significantly raise the cap or remove it all together?   Did they predict that in addition to the significant increase in damages that their ability to earn would be affected by Obama’s restrictions on new drilling; or that taxes and royalties would be increased significantly ; or that people would boycott their products on mass?

The point is, no matter how sophisticated your risk management process, you can be wrong.  Don’t take that to mean that it isn’t worth trying!  What I’m saying is that no matter how much you prepare and plan and execute, things can happen that are worse than you could have imagined.

When it comes to company killers, all companies big or small have them lurking around and if the perfect storm happens you could be next!  So what can we do?  Most company killers are closely related to reputation risk.  Whether it’s an oil spill, a product recall, or a fraud scandal, the resulting damage to the company’s reputation is where the biggest losses are felt.  Incidents such as these rattle customer and shareholder confidence which can often lead to a rapid and irreversible downward spiral.  Reduced sales, increased costs, battered share value, employees leaving the sinking ship and on it goes until there’s nothing left to salvage.

Do not despair!  As with any risk, big or small, there are ways to manage reputation risk.  Here are a few general tips:

• Consider all underlying risks that can lead to damaged reputation, and mitigate them as best you can within your means.  Ask yourself (and your team), what things could happen that would damage our reputation enough that it will cause significant harm to your company?
• In addition to managing the underlying risk, treat reputation risk as one of your company’s biggest risks.
• Develop emergency and contingency plans that deal directly with reputation risk.  How will you respond?  How will you communicate to customers and other stakeholders?  How will you control the damage?
• Look for ways to diversify your operations enough that significant harm to one division or company won’t necessarily damage the others.
• Check with your Insurance Broker to make sure you have the necessary coverages and limits to deal with the fallout from reputation related risks.  For example, coverages such as products recall, environmental impairment and business interruption are often not carried and are seen as unnecessary, but can provide the necessary buffers in the case of major losses, so that reputation can be dealt with effectively.

All organizations need to start to understand reputation risk and realize that it is one of their greatest risks. The following are starting points to consider in managing reputation risk using a hotel chain as an example.  For more information on this and other risks, please visit the free ClearRisk Library.

Tools:

ClearRisk’s Reputation Risk Management Tool

ClearRisk Library

References:

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-06-30/senate-panel-moves-to-lift-cap-on-oil-spill-damages.html

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,521341,00.html

ClearRisk 2.0 Launched Today!

Today ClearRisk Inc is proud to announce the  launch of version 2.0 of its ClearRisk Manager application. Version 2.0  is built to improve every user’s experience. The site is faster, it enables easier collaboration and includes functionality that will allow our users who are Insurance Brokers to interact with clients in ways they’ve never been able to before.

ClearRisk Manager Version 2.0 is designed to be lightning fast. “We’ve increased the speed of the site by almost 4x,” said John Downey, Director of Systems for ClearRisk Inc “we’ve created a seamless experience for brokers; almost unnoticeable page loads and large reports take only a few seconds, unlike minutes or hours for some competitive systems.”

Clients of Insurance brokers are demanding risk management options that go beyond insurance coverage. Some brokerages are struggling with how to effectively provide these services to their clients. That’s why we built ClearRisk Manager. We want Insurance brokers to have an affordable way to provide their clients with risk management plans, risk maps and risk management resources – even if they have little to no risk management training.

Using ClearRisk Manager to help identify, prioritize and manage client risks, brokers can offer affordable risk management support to clients; helping clients get the best terms in the insurance market

We’ve built on this concept in Version 2.0, by adding more client and broker collaboration tools, and increasing the speed of the site even more. ClearRisk Manager 2.0 can be used to store, track and share all relevant risk and insurance information such as insurance policies, claims documents, and insurance certificates. It gives Brokers and their clients the ability track progress they make over time.

In addition, ClearRisk Manager 2.0 introduces functionality that allows Brokers to Co-Brand the secure online portal. It’s important for Brokers to have multiple touch points with clients throughout the year. Every time a client logs on to ClearRisk Manager to work on their Risk Management plan, the host Broker’s logo can be prominently displayed. From the client’s perspective, the Broker is providing them with a software solution comparable to those offered by only large multinational brokers. This, in combination with the collaboration tools above, shows the clients firsthand the value the Broker is bringing to their business.

ClearRisk’s focus has been on increasing broker profitability with mid-market Risk Management Solutions. ClearRisk Manager 2.0 provides brokers with even more functionality to help them become the preferred provider of risk management and insurance products and services.

The following video is a popular resource for insurance brokers who are evaluating the use of risk management as a value added service.

Top 10 ways to use Risk Management to Increase Brokerage Revenue

Come view the new functionality with a 30-day free-trial

or let one of our associates walk you through ClearRisk Manager 2.0 with a 20 min tutorial

The Risk Management Process – In 5 Steps

I have always been a firm believer that good risk management doesn’t have to be resource intensive, difficult for SMBs to undertake or insurance brokers to provide to their clients. With a little formalization, structure and a strong understanding of your organization, risk management planning can be rewarding.

Risk management does require some investment of time and money but it does not need to be substantial to be effective. In fact it will be more likely to be employed and maintained if it is implemented gradually over time. The key is to have a basic understanding of the process and to move towards its implementation.  That is exactly why ClearRisk has developed its newest whitepaper: The Risk Management Process

There are many different risk management models available. Often times these models are unnecessarily complicated or written for an academic audience. We’ve developed this whitepaper from industry best practices and experience and in a way to which business people can relate.

In summary, the five steps in the risk management process are:

1.   Identify Potential Risks:
What can possibly go wrong?

The Risk Management Process

2.   Measure Frequency and Severity:
What is the likelihood of the risk occurring and if so what is the impact?

3.   Examine Alternative Solutions:
What are the potential ways to treat the risk and of these, which strikes the best balance between being affordable and effective?

4.   Decide Which Solution to Use and Implement it:
Find the needed resources, get the necessary buy-in and pull the trigger.

5.   Monitor Results:
Is your plan working? Are changes or updates required?

The whitepaper explains each of these steps in detail so you can move towards implementing a risk management plan. Click to view the free whitepaper on the Risk Management Process.

10 Steps to a SMB Risk Management Process

This week, ClearRisk presents a guest post by Thomas M. Bragg. Tom, who has specialized in business planning, strategy and business risk management for 20 years, writes a blog about practical risk management for small business.

More and more is being written about risk management for small and medium sized businesses (SMBs). In fact, if you do a little bit of research, you’ll probably find yourself soon overwhelmed with advice, methods, terminology and tools.

Getting started with any new process is tough. It’s hard to get out of the blocks. It’s scary. It seems overwhelming.

Don’t be overwhelmed. I’m here to tell you that establishing an effective risk management process for your business doesn’t have to be difficult.

Read more

ClearRisk.com: New and Improved!

I am very pleased to announce the launch of the new ClearRisk.com! Over the past few months, our ClearRisk team has been working to create a website that is strong in design, content, usability and interactivity.

In creating the new site, our focus has been on :

• Improving navigation
• Providing new risk management resources
• Incorporating more accessible support and 24/7 chat
• Improving speed and usability for our online risk management solution ClearRisk Manager.

Now that it has been launched, we would really like to hear from you. Visit the sites, browse around and tell us what you think! All feedback is greatly appreciated so please help us make ClearRisk.com even better.

LinkedIn responds to ‘Why should all the benefits of risk management go to big companies?’

Last week, we followed our blog post ‘Big Companies Get It, Why Don’t SMBs?‘ with a related question posed to the LinkedIn community. As we’ve experienced with the professionals on LinkedIn, the response was strong and made for a great discussion. A lot of different explanations and solutions were proposed and we would like to share them with you here.

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Exploring Enterprise Risk Management and Organizational Culture: Part One

Tom Cooper is currently an Assistant Professor at Memorial University in the area of strategic management. As a member of the ClearRisk Board of Advisors, Tom’s research and blogging focuses primarily on the interplay between strategy, risk and compliance as well as their effects on corporate responsibility. This week Tom is shifting from his discussion of strategic risk to enterprise risk management and organizational culture.

As we all know, the concept of risk management is gaining prominence in both the corporate and academic arenas. This series of blogs explores the importance of how a risk culture achieves effective risk management practices. Focusing on how organization risk cultures develop, we need to consider the personal and organizational influences on risk culture.

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Blog Opportunities and Risk Management

For the most part, bloggers all want to do the same thing; provide value for, build relationships with, and encourage conversation within a targeted audience. With an estimated 364 million blog readers and 77-percent of all web users reading blogs in 2008, the power, influence, and potential that comes along with blogging is undeniable.

With many deciding to start corporate blogs and employee blogging initiatives, companies are hoping that sending their employees to the front lines to communicate with the public will bring openness and approachability to the organization’s image and to its relationship with customers.

As with any opportunities, there are always related risks and risk management solutions. How do you put that kind of trust in someone to speak openly and freely on behalf of the entire company? What do you do when something goes wrong? What could go wrong?

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Protecting Employees with Risk Management

Robert has been one of your most trusted employees for fifteen years. He is extremely hard working, dedicated to the organization and consistently goes above and beyond to make the company better.

While delegating tasks to your warehouse staff, Robert loses his footing and falls six feet from a platform to the floor below. He is badly hurt, spending months in recovery and is unable to return to work.

What do you tell his family? How do you replace him? What are the costs?

Unfortunately, accidents and situations like this happen far too often. Work-related injuries and illnesses devastate families and businesses with extreme financial and non-financial consequences.

In past entries, we’ve looked at employee safety-related topics like stress, liquor liability, the H1N1 flu virus and more. Today, we’re exploring workplace hazards and their associated costs and effects.

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Strategic Risk as an Element of Operational Risk

Tom Cooper is currently an Assistant Professor at Memorial University in the area of strategic management. As a member of ClearRisk Board of Advisors, Tom’s research and blogging focuses primarily on the interplay between strategy, risk and compliance as well as their effects on corporate responsibility. ‘Strategic Risk as an Element of Operational Risk’ is the fourth in this ongoing series.

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