New business models, emerging new players, speed and ease of change, need for greater agility and flexibility, increasingly sophisticated and more pervasive threats, changing skillsets and unprecedented levels of disruption and uncertainty. Organizations are increasingly having to build the plane while they’re flying it.
A key player in helping organizations navigate this complexity is risk management. From our conversations and experience with leadership teams and Supervisory Boards, it’s clear that risk leaders face some unique demands. Through our assessment work, we have found that the leadership bench in the risk function is typically thinner than in other parts of the organization. And anecdotal evidence suggests to us that, of all C-Suite positions, the Chief Risk Officer seems to experience higher levels of turnover. Why is this?
To find out, we teamed up with our friends at Adam Appointments, specialists in corporate and risk recruitment, and the Institute of Operational Risk to get a better handle on the issue. We conducted one of the most in-depth pieces of research on the topic including interviews with a range of senior leaders in the field and a survey of over 200 experienced risk practitioners to better understand:
- What are the distinctive capabilities and qualities required to be a successful risk leader?
- How do the current crop of risk leaders stack up against these requirements?
- How will these change over the next 3-5 years?
- How can we better prepare and develop future risk leaders for the challenges they will face?
The results are pretty illuminating. We have summarized them in a punchy report and accompanying webinar. The key outcome is a Risk Leader Success Profile that provides a blueprint for selecting, developing and promoting risk leaders. We also provide practical guidance on what organizations and individuals can do to future-proof their risk leadership capabilities.
