Businesses Continue to Place High Priority on Risk Management

New survey results show that businesses, in general, continue to rank enterprise risk management as a high priority. And yet, different sectors are now focusing on different aspects of their particular risk profiles. Financial institutions, for instance, tend to place a strong emphasis on liquidity risk buffers and stress testing. Nonfinancial firms are focusing more on operational risk and cash flow at risk.

The survey, conducted by the Professional Risk Managers' International Association (PRMIA) and Microsoft Corp., polled 1,662 global PRMIA members. Most (84 percent) were from financial institutions, while 16 percent were from nonfinancial institutions.

Interestingly, the risk managers participating in the study identified deeper business knowledge and quantitative and communication expertise as the top skills required for future risk and compliance roles. In addition, survey respondents said that in the future they expect to see:


more automation and self-serve analytical tools,


greater visualization of risk as a means to increase enterprise-wide collaboration, and


improved technology to enhance workplace productivity and efficiency.


Let's hope so. As I have pointed out before, many firms remain resistant to updating procurement analytics strategies even though research has shown that automating certain common business process can result in


significant cost savings,


error reduction, and


risk mitigation.


Don't kid yourself. When risk management processes aren't automated and integrated, the pain is felt throughout your organization, and the benefits are muted. This new study confirms, once again, that companies are beginning to recognize how technology can improve workflows and compliance, while simultaneously reducing risk.

More discussion about the PRMIA survey will be ongoing at the MSDN blog.