Businesses face risk every day. In fact, without risk a business or organisation would not grow and thrive.

Risk Management is the process which aims to help organisations understand, evaluate and take action on all their risks with a view to increasing the probability of their success and reducing the likelihood of failure.

Risk management gives comfort to stakeholders (shareholders, customers, employees and so on) that the business is being effectively managed and helps the organisation confirm its compliance with corporate governance requirements.

Risk Management is relevant to all organisations whether they are in the public or private sector, or whether they are large or small. It should form part of the culture of the organisation, with an effective policy and programme led by top management with clear responsibilities laid down for every manager and employee to be involved in the management of risk. It supports accountability, performance measurement and reward thus promoting efficiency at all levels.

The key stages of the risk management process are set out in the Risk Management Standard which may be downloaded free from this website, or purchased in hard copy.

Within larger organisations there is likely to be a need for a dedicated Risk Manager whose role would include:

	setting policy and strategy for risk management,
	being the primary champion of risk management at strategic and operational levels
	building a risk aware culture within the organisation including appropriate education and training
	establishing internal risk policy and structures for business units
	developing risk response processes including contingency and business continuity programmes
	preparing reports for the board and the stakeholders

Risk management requires a detailed knowledge and understanding of the organisation and the processes involved in the business. As well as internal specialists there is a huge number of different advisers and consultants providing support to an organisation's risk management programme. Because of this, risk management is a truly multi-disciplinary profession. See the careers section of this website for more information.