Thomas M. Bragg on Business Risk Management

If you’ve been keeping score at home, you know that the risk management process has three basic steps – 1) identify risks and opportunities, 2) evaluate the risks and opportunities and 3) plan for risks and opportunities. However, there is some work that needs to happen before you get into the nuts and bolts of managing your risks.

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This week let’s talk about what needs to happen before the process begins. There are some basic activities: inspiration, motivation and preparation. Over the last few months I’ve written several posts dealing with the “pre-activities”. Let’s take a look at each of them. Read the rest of this entry »

www.clearrisk.com

I am honored that Craig and his team at ClearRisk Inc. accepted one of my posts for publication in the ClearRisk blog. The post is titled “10 Steps to a SMB Risk Management Process“.

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The Post’s Backstory

Over the last week or so, I’ve been contemplating the information I’ve seen on the web about business risk management. Read the rest of this entry »

Image by UnstablePixel via Flickr

It was a lightbulb moment. A few weeks back, a friend and I were talking about  the tendency of some companies to analyze and hold meetings, hold meetings and analyze, discuss, research and discuss again without taking any action. We were interested in the root cause of the perpetual analysis (a.k.a. analysis paralysis). Was it an extreme desire for precision and perfection? Or was it a fear of making mistakes? Read the rest of this entry »

In my opinion, few business people recognize that risk has a very real (and substantial) value. The lack of recognition is understandable – it’s hard to put a convincing numerical value on a risk that may or may not occur. But every now and then, an event comes along that provides a quantified glimpse of risk’s value. I was a witness to one of those rare events. Here’s the story… Read the rest of this entry »

If you’ve been keeping score at home, you’ve noticed that I’ve used the word ‘formal’ quite a bit. In fact, in one poorly worded post I suggested that “the (risk management) process doesn’t have to be formal” and got called to the carpet in a comment by Kristen. She was absolutely correct in stating that the process really does have to be formalized – meaning performed consistently and methodically – but doesn’t have to be complicated, expensive or burdensome (a point I attempted, and failed, to make).

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That exchange was a good example of how the word ‘formal’ can be misused or at least have different meanings to different people. In my last post about cost benefit analysis, I was again throwing around the f-word (no, not that one…) somewhat carelessly. Let’s take a step back and explore what really characterizes a “formal” process. Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s a Quiz For You

What do these decisions have in common?

• Is it wise for me to invest in new equipment for my business?
• Should I respond to the irate customer’s email or just let it go?
• Is the best route turning left, turning right or going straight?
• Should I have beef or chicken for dinner tonight?
• Should I wear the blue shirt or the green shirt today?

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Give up? Read the rest of this entry »

If you will allow me to indulge, I want to take a step away from the uber-tight focus on risk management for a minute. I was on a tele-conference today. During the conversation I shared that my dream is for my company to evolve into a “sales organization” that does engineering services rather than an “engineering organization” that does sales.

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On the other end of the call, Paul asked me what I meant. I’ve been thinking about the topic ever since and I’d like to share my thoughts with you. The distinction isn’t limited to only engineering services companies. It applies to every type of business out there. Read the rest of this entry »

To be honest, I’ve debated about whether I should write about financial modeling. If you’re anything like my girlfriend Amy, the mere thought of financial modeling causes great anxiety and a profound desire to change the topic. And I’m pretty sure that a post on creating spreadsheet representations of your business may not go viral.

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But the simple truth is that financial models are incredibly powerful tools and they’re not that hard to create. Models are also required to do certain types of risk evaluation (as I talk about here, here and here..) In fact, models of the financial kind can be kind of sexy – at least to the engineering types like me.

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Well, now that I think about it the models really aren’t that sexy…did I mention that financial models are incredibly powerful? Read the rest of this entry »

Let’s drill down a bit into risk evaluation – step 2 in the risk management process. It’s standard practice to evaluate a risk or opportunity’s impact and rank it. You can rank the impact on a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 being the highest impact. Or you can rank the impact “high”, “medium”, or “low”. Or if you’re utilizing financial models you can calculate the risk’s impact and represent it in terms of your local currency.

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Seems very straight forward, right? It is, but let’s take a step back and ask “Impact on what?” Read the rest of this entry »

My girlfriend Amy has a home-based, small business, working as a professional wedding and portrait photographer (one of the best in my very-biased opinion, but check out her site and judge for yourself.) I work with Amy as a PT photographer on weekends and also help her out on the business side of things. As I’ve learned the in’s and out’s of a home-based, single person business, I’ve been paying attention to its similarities and differences in terms of risk management. Read the rest of this entry »