Risk Evaluation & Mitigation
We Help Boards Achieve Risk Maturity
Strengthen your Board’s performance
through better governance, leadership and risk management.
Elevate Your Risk Management Strategy
Whether your organisation is at the inception of a risk management program or seeking to elevate an existing one, a clear vision and a well-crafted roadmap make all the difference. Our expertise can guide your Board through this process, ensuring a strategic understanding of the risk process, risk mitigation, holding management to account, and considering the risks not raised via an enterprise-wide process.
Understanding the key risks that impact your organisation is paramount. Our approach involves identifying the high-level and strategic risks and comprehending how they shape outcomes. Directors with strategic insight and a board-level understanding of the operational risks will more effectively contribute to informed decision-making. The heightened clarity on risk understanding will deliver greater transparency on risk reporting to stakeholders. Recognising that opportunity is closely tied to risk and that businesses or individuals cannot exist in a completely risk-free environment, the focus should be on managing risks effectively to seize opportunities.
Genius Boards’ role is to provide independent strategic assessment of the risks to the business. Elevate your risk management to mitigate threats and capitalise on opportunities that drive sustainable growth.
How We Can Help Your Board & Organisation Achieve Risk Maturity
We work with your board to create their own “mini” board risk register that contains the types of risks that are often overlooked by operational teams. The types of issues likely to appear on this register are likely related to people, sustainability, and reputation.
Our approach involves aligning the board directors’ mindset with risks at the unknown level. This enables strategic scenario planning, positioning the board optimally to navigate and effectively address impending challenges.
Discover more about our risk management services and how we can streamline your organisation’s risk management practices.
Risk Evaluation and Awareness
Genius Boards facilitates the assessment of corporate risk, including reputational risk and directors’ personal risks, to evaluate the board’s current risk awareness and maturity levels. We benchmark these findings against industry best practices and peers, providing a clear picture of where the board stands.
Gap Analysis
We identify gaps and weaknesses in your organisation’s board and governance of risk management processes, thereby helping boards pinpoint areas that require improvement.
Identifying Key Risks
It is critical that your business readdresses its risk appetite, risk aversion, risk maturity, risk avoidance on a regular basis.
After completing a comprehensive risk assessment, the next critical step involves initiating regular feedback sessions. These sessions are instrumental in gauging the progress of the board and your entire organisation in managing risks and reaching a heightened awareness of potential risks and challenges.
In this way, your business not only adapts proactively to emerging threats but also avoids becoming a hindrance to its own progress.
This proactive approach, supported by regular feedback mechanisms, empowers your organisation to navigate uncertainties and challenges, contributing to its resilience and sustained value creation.
Creative Risk Solution Workshops
We guide your Board through innovative workshops to brainstorm and develop creative solutions tailored to your organisation’s unique risk landscape. Empowering Directors to think outside the box can be a very uncomfortable exercise for certain personality types. This needs to be recognised and handled to retain their comfort and not feel threatened.
Our expert facilitators assist in addressing risk issues that are crucial to your organisation’s image, reputation and brand perception among stakeholders.
We also offer tailored recommendations and action plans to enhance risk awareness and maturity. This includes suggesting changes to Board Committees to encompass a dedicated Risk Committee, to the main board agenda, to better address the risks as a board.
Crisis Management and Media Response
Genius Boards specialises in crisis management, either offering training to prepare or providing assistance alongside a board during times of crisis.
Working in collaboration with the Chair, Risk Chair and Company Secretary to define and support the CEO in implementing strategic crises communication strategies. We provide independent risk insights into both traditional and social media communications on information dissemination or assumptions during times of crises.
Furthermore, we seamlessly embed the response process within the overarching risk management strategy. Crises are inevitable, our service focuses on how organisations respond. The ability to respond effectively defines long-term sustainability and resilience.
Board Development & Training
Continuous training and skills development empower directors with the necessary knowledge and capabilities to effectively fulfil their responsibilities, actively contribute to governance processes, and adeptly navigate the intricacies of corporate and board decision-making.
Our tailored board training solutions not only enhance directors’ understanding of governance practices but also align directors with the evolving expectations for the board’s role within your organisation.Committing to the continuous development of directors’ skills and knowledge in corporate governance is an investment in the long-term success and sustainability of your organisation.Find out more about Genius Board’s Board Development & Training services.
Empowering Boards to Navigate Risk
Helping Boards Navigate Corporate Risk, Reputation, and Crisis Management
Our Risk Assessment Process
Our approach to risk assessment can be qualitative or quantitative, or a combination of these two approaches. The choice will depend on the industry, the board and its risk likelihood, the severity of impact, and board risk maturity in dealing with the risks at hand.
- Qualitative Assessment
- Quantitative Assessment
- Embedding Value
This process entails participation in Board and Risk Committee meetings, engaging in one-to-one discussions and forums to assess risks comprehensively, both from strategic and high-level operational perspectives. The conversation will involve the Chair of the Board, Chair of the Risk Committee, Directors, Company Secretary, and the Head of Risk within the business, including individuals addressing operational risk concerns, such as those in the IT environment.
This evaluation may involve Internal Audit, essential external providers, and, if applicable, relevant regulatory bodies.
The output of this process is a comprehensive written report containing actionable recommendations.
This process encompasses either:
- A benchmark assessment tailored to the industry and focused on aspects such as risk maturity, risk committee focus, or risk governance.
- A customised questionnaire designed to address the specific risks within an organisation. This may substitute the qualitative assessment or complement it by addressing a particular area for greater clarity.
These assessments are conducted online, presenting bespoke questions and multiple-choice answers that demand careful consideration to ascertain the most applicable responses and provide additional written insights.
The output includes quantitative reports, graphs, and a written summary report featuring actionable recommendations.
It is critical that your business readdresses its risk appetite, risk aversion, risk maturity, risk avoidance on a regular basis.
After completing a comprehensive risk assessment, the next critical step involves initiating regular feedback sessions. These sessions are instrumental in gauging the progress of the board and your entire organisation in managing risks and reach a heightened awareness of potential risks and challenges.
In this way, your business not only adapts proactively to emerging threats but also avoids becoming a hindrance to its own progress.
This proactive approach, supported by regular feedback mechanisms, empowers your organisation to navigate uncertainties and challenges, contributing to its resilience and sustained value creation.
“The biggest risk is not taking any risk at all.” Mark Zuckerberg | CEO – Facebook
The Value of a Risk Mature Board
A Risk Mature Board offers significant advantages to your organisation, providing a foundation for effective risk management and strategic decision-making. Evaluating a board’s risk awareness and risk maturity can provide valuable assistance to boards in several ways:
Proactive Risk Management:
Ensures your organisation is well prepared to navigate uncertainties & challenges, efficiently & effectively. Allowing for changing situations and arising risk situations.
Strategic Alignment:
A mature board will naturally align the strategic conversations to the risk appetite and risk environment.. Thereby protecting the business from undue business behaviours.
Enhanced Decision-Making:
Enhances decision-making, where bias, influence and personal agendas have been successfully removed, leads to better-informed choices supporting your organisation’s long-term success.
Resilience and Adaptability:
Being a mature board means that resilience has been built through experience. Competent and independent thinking Directors can support agile conversations, decisions and provide support to the executive. These acquired abilities contribute to enhancing the board's capability to deliver competent responses to unforeseen challenges, which is crucial for long term sustainability.
Improved Stakeholder Confidence:
Transparent & well-managed risks contribute to building trust & credibility with investors, employees & customers and other stakeholders.
Regulatory Compliance:
Minimises the risk of regulatory challenges & ensures your Board can easily navigate regulatory & compliance requirements. Understanding the mindset of the regulator and your customer market are critical to effective risk outcomes.
Efficient Resource Allocation:
If risks are addressed in a robust fashion your organisation can efficiently allocate resources toward managing the most critical risks, optimising performance & maximising value generation.
Financial Performance:
Having the right risk management strategy and risk mitigation plans in place, the business is protected against high value risk costs, which therefore protects consistent (near) risk free financial performance and financial sustainability.
Our Commitment
Genius Boards is your partner in elevating your boards risk awareness and maturity. Our solutions encompass risk evaluation, innovative problem-solving, crisis management, and risk maturity training.
With our guidance, your board can navigate the intricacies of risk management, ensuring a robust strategy that aligns with industry standards and enhances overall organisational resilience.
Risks arise and crises will happen, it is when and how well your organisation responds that defines its sustainability in the long term.
Ready to take your board’s performance to the next level?
Feel free to get in touch to find out how we can help empower your board to perform at its best.
- If you are interested in learning more about Genius Boards' board performance review services.
- If you are interested to engage an external board evaluator accredited by CGI UK and Ireland for your next board review.
- If you would like more information on our review process and approaches.
- If you have some questions related to board dynamics culture, composition and structure, or any other topics.
Please reach out to Sharon Constançon of Genius Boards for a no commitment, free conversation or contact us directly.
How we can help your Board
Achieve Risk Maturity & Safeguard your Organisation's Future
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