http://www.thomasmbragg.com Practical Risk Management for Small Business Owners and Managers Thu, 11 Mar 2010 02:19:21 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Image by Eustaquio Santimano via Flickr 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 ... http://www.thomasmbragg.com/2010/03/10/risk-management-inspiration-motivation-preparation/ [caption id="" align="alignright" width="250" caption="www.clearrisk.com"][/caption] 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". . The Post's Backstory Over the last week or so, I've been contemplating the information ... http://www.thomasmbragg.com/2010/03/03/guest-post-at-clearrisk-com/ [caption id="" align="alignright" width="240" caption="Image by UnstablePixel via Flickr"][/caption] 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 ... http://www.thomasmbragg.com/2010/03/01/permission-to-make-mistakes/ Image via Wikipedia 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 ... http://www.thomasmbragg.com/2010/02/22/the-value-of-risk/ Image by dirtyhamster via Flickr 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 ... http://www.thomasmbragg.com/2010/02/15/should-you-go-formal-or-informal/ Image by cubajones via Flickr 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 ... http://www.thomasmbragg.com/2010/02/11/the-solution-to-every-decision/ Image via Wikipedia 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 ... http://www.thomasmbragg.com/2010/02/02/is-your-company-a-sales-organization/ Image by lochnessjess via Flickr 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 ... http://www.thomasmbragg.com/2010/01/29/sexy-models-of-the-financial-kind/ Image by Jayson Ignacio via Flickr 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 ... http://www.thomasmbragg.com/2010/01/22/risks-impact-on-what/ Image via Wikipedia 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 ... http://www.thomasmbragg.com/2010/01/18/home-based-business-risk/