Video transcript

The leadership agenda

Should you change how you see risk?

Managing risk isn't just about reacting to change. It's about changing the way we see risk, shifting our perspective considering different angles using new techniques and data to do it. The leadership challenge in this day is complex and we're seeing and helping many organisations at PwC take four actions to change how they see risk, how they strengthen their organisation for the future. 

First of those is to require a more panoramic view of risks. CEO is making bold moves and they own their teams generally understand the key moving pieces that contribute to risk in their organisation. But the interconnectedness and at times unintended consequences are surprising them. So, there's a real opportunity to use some of that new risk tech available, move to much stronger scenario modelling, much stronger monitoring of the risk landscape. The Chief Risk Officers’ key to curating all of this but the entire executive team gets great value and understanding from leveraging it. 

Second, is to state your risk appetite and set a strong risk culture so that you can take advantage of upside risks. Most organisations have adjusted their risk settings. They’re facing some challenges getting their people and culture to move with them. Risk appetites are the key tool to help everyone in the organisation understand where they're able to take more risks in pursuit of opportunity. And a strong risk culture plays a very key role in leveraging the upside risks in agile manner and protecting you from the down. PwC’s global risks survey shows that over half of leaders are now moving in this direction, almost 60% have defined a risk appetite and are investing in risk culture. 

Thirdly, is to position the organisation to anticipate risks and to see these changes in real time, leaders need to be able to act with confidence and agility and the world is moving so quickly, you can’t anticipate future risk just by studying the past. But only 29% of organisations we've surveyed are significantly investing in their risk technology to detect and monitor risks. In contrast, risk functions with really advanced capabilities here are using external data, analytic techniques, have an intelligence across that risk tech landscape, much in the way that other functions have, such as finance, customer, operations and so forth. 

Finally the fourth, is to engage a connected community of solvers to support risk informed decision-making. It takes diverse perspectives working together to seize opportunities in a risk away risk management is a team sport. And 70% of organisations in our survey are prioritising diversity of skills in their risk critical roles. 

These four actions are really helping executive teams gain some real-time visibility and act with the sort of confidence that it's going to generate them competitive advantage forward. 

I hope these four actions are going to be useful for your executive team so that you can strengthen your organisation to act boldly with confidence and generate the competitive advantage that you wish through great risk competence.