BCM think tank outcomes
Leading the Risk Management fraternity, the Institute of Risk Management South Africa (IRMSA) called on Chief Risk Officers (CROs) and Heads of Risk for a high-level round table discussion to share their challenges and learnings from rolling-out their Business Continuity Management (BCM) plans in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Also, and maybe now more importantly, whilst they may be all consumed with what lies immediately ahead of them, they also discussed the risks and opportunities they should have on their radar between now and when life returns to “normal” – whenever that may be and whatever shape and form “normal” will take on.
Insurance cover
With the current economic crisis, and the COVID-19 pandemic compounding to the woes, it seems as if industries are getting ready to shed jobs. This is something economists have pointed out and predicted during the global economic meltdown.
Chief Risk Advisor at IRMSA, Christopher Palm, said one of critical issues touched on by the think tank was the issue of insurance cover.
“Interestingly highlighted by the panel… if one does not have insurance cover for the loss of income right now, the chances are that they will not ever have it because it’s been removed from the bouquet of cover. If you have it, you’ll have to look at the policy wording to understand the detail of it,” he said.
The big misses… or not?
The panel asked critical questions related to their profession and these included staff working remotely, insurance (as mentioned above), technology and BCM models, among others.
Some of these introspective questions asked among the panelists were, “when did you start your business continuity management roll-out? Was it in January or February when we saw the problem spreading globally, or was it on that one very special Sunday evening after which everybody sort of got direction and started acting upon this? This is a very crucial question because it will tell you about your organisation’s risk maturity, and it will tell you about the readiness to deal with business continuity management. As a matter of fact, it will tell you whether your organisation is taking risk seriously and understood this pandemic, even before it became one,” mentioned Palm.
Basic business risk management was also raised by the panel in relation to addressing the ability to communicate with staff remotely, having the staff communication plans in place, including connectivity of staff and analyzing the cyber risks.
Looking into business impact analysis (BIA)
One of the points raised unanimously across the round table, was the whole idea of having had or having done a business impact analysis.
The point that came out was that business impact analysis is not an event, it’s something that has to happen regularly, something that happened across processes, products and services.
“Business impact analysis is a process where companies need to understand which things are critical to the survival of the organisation and which are the things that, like in the situation right now, they can do without,” explained Palm.
Considering additional risks, the round table discussed communication with staff and working remotely, also on the issue of having the right technology available, the right connectivity available and more importantly, the update of software on these remote technologies that are used for the organisations’ service.
Opportunities
The panel discussed “opportunities” now availed to organisations since the risk has materialized. These included an even faster and wider adoption of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, better use of technology and thought processes, social responsibility and upliftment, as well as the real opportunity to upgrade risk management.
“We are now being challenged to roll out the Fourth industrial Revolution. We are now being challenged to put speed and effort into it, and to make it effective. We have seen that there are better uses for our existing technology, new applications are being developed at the drop of a hat, and we suddenly see staff coming up with new ideas and being fairly innovative,” said Palm.
Writer’s thoughts:
The COVID-19 pandemic presents a good opportunity to Risk Managers to get the risk management within companies up to speed. This includes things like administering new technologies, which included the inadequately tested and “dangerous” 5G technology, which is already being rolled-out around the world. Please comment below, interact with us on Twitter at @fanews_online or email me your thoughts Mashoto@fanews.co.za.
