A world of risk

As is true with conflicts of interest, C&E risk assessment is the source of near endless interest to me. (No wonder I don’t get invited to parties!)

The importance of risk assessment is obvious from the many cases where the failures to understand or sufficiently address risk have led to C&E catastrophes. But the benefits of risk assessment are not limited to preventing failures. It can also be a “delivery device” for introducing new ideas and information – such as those found in behavioral ethics – into C&E programs, and thereby help keep such programs vibrant.

My interest in risk assessment goes back aways. I believe that a book chapter I wrote in 1993 for Compliance Programs and the Corporate Sentencing Guidelines was the first instance in which conducting a stand-alone C&E risk assessment – then called a “liability inventory” – was proposed (although obviously the COSO framework, which had a compliance component, predates that).  And this interest stretches into the future,  as I recently authored the risk assessment section for a commemorative guide being published this fall by the Ethics and Compliance Officer Association in connection with that organization’s 20th anniversary. (Hope to see you at the conference!)

For those who share an interest in risk assessment, here’s a link to a page on the Corporate Compliance Insights web site collecting several years’ worth of risk assessment pieces that I have written, with a “greatest hits” post that ran today.