Financial knowledge

Risk management is the process of identifying, assessing and managing potential issues that could have a negative impact on an organization’s business operations and financial performance. It involves being mindful of potential risks and what could go wrong — both the expected and the unexpected. Risk managers must be aware of all forms of risk…

Risk management requires constant education and keeping up with relevant news, trends and issues. Not so long ago, no one had heard of ransomware. Now, it’s one of the greatest cybersecurity threats that companies face. News sites and industry journals should be regular reading material for risk managers.

This goes hand in hand with the leadership skills. Risk managers must be able to build relationships — and not just with their immediate subordinates. They should also be able to do so with their superiors, as well as other corporate executives and department heads.

After preparing the ranked list of risks, a risk manager then needs to lead the process of planning how to manage them. That could include accepting risks that are deemed reasonable based on an organization’s agreed-upon risk appetite and risk tolerance or adopting strategies to mitigate risks so they pose less of a business threat. In other…

To identify and estimate risks to a company, risk managers need to understand how the business works. They can’t say finance doesn’t matter because they’re in IT, or vice versa. Business understanding is a must — especially if the risk manager aspires to join the C-suite in the future.

No sports team ever wins by only playing defense — and that applies here, too. If risk managers look at how things affect the business as a whole, they might come up with a better way for their organization to operate. Part of a risk manager’s job is to see the big picture — and…