As the pace of change continues to accelerate, organizations have more opportunities than ever before to engage with and inspire their customers. Despite the fact that this is no doubt a welcomed development, these opportunities also create additional risks that organizations need to protect against.
Unfortunately, there isn’t a surefire way to predict every risk an organization might face. That said, companies can implement and adhere to a risk management process that enables them to prepare and protect themselves and their employees from operational challenges and incidents.
So what is risk management, and what types of tools are best prepared to facilitate a risk management process? Let’s take a look.
What is a risk management process?
Simply put, a risk management process is a structured approach in which organizations identify, analyze, accept, or mitigate risks to prevent them from damaging operations or minimize potential losses.
Every decision your organization makes exposes you to the possibility of negative outcomes. For example, a software company might be really excited to roll out a new update for a SaaS product, only to find out the hard way that the update knocked the platform offline—and angered customers who relied on it for mission-critical workflows.
Though risk management is critical for all areas of operations, it is particularly important in incident, audit, and claims management processes. With so much on the line, many smart organizations rely on purpose-built tools designed specifically to help them oversee the various stages of risk management.
Generally speaking, organizations have two options at this point:
- A database-driven approach to risk management that involves simply capturing and reflecting data
- A process-driven approach which is intuitive, customizable, and actionable to truly drive positive outcomes
The database-driven approach is better than nothing, but it leaves much to be desired when compared to the process-driven approach.
A process-driven risk management approach leads to better outcomes.
At a high level, a process-driven approach to risk management enables organizations to improve business outcomes because of a confluence of three benefits.
1. Taking Faster Action
When incidents occur, time is of the essence and every minute counts. Using a process-based approach, teams can leverage built-in rules and notifications based on updated and incoming information, which helps organizations take action to mitigate risk faster. Imagine an intelligent, intuitive process that can pivot for you ... that's a process-driven approach! A database-driven approach, in contrast, forces teams to be reactive to incoming information.
2. Making Data-Driven Decisions
With a database-driven approach, organizations only capture data and receive reports. A process-driven system delivers considerably more control over data and insights thanks to interactive workflows that make data more actionable.
For example, teams can create tasks and responsibilities that are trackable. They can also slice and dice data to identify trends and make data-driven decisions—instead of passively analyzing reports after the fact.
3. Evolving as Requirements Change
Process-driven risk management approaches can be refined and updated as operational and environmental changes occur, which enables organizations to evolve and keep pace with emerging risks and threats.
Pulpstream, for instance, gives process owners the tools and abilities they need to build and manage the process flow—without having to write a single line of code. This allows them to make adjustments as situations change, ensuring they’re always ready to respond to risks.
Are you happy with your organization’s approach to risk management?
No matter the industry your organization operates in, every decision you make comes with risk.
Although you can’t eliminate risk, you can take proactive steps to ensure threats impact your operations as little as possible.
By investing in solutions that enable you to take a process-driven approach to risk management, you can put your organization in a strong position to respond to and mitigate risks as quickly as possible, thereby lessening whatever impacts might befall your operations.
For more information on how a process-driven approach to risk management can ensure your team has the right information in the right place—and that you’re ready to respond to incidents as rapidly as possible—get a proof of concept demo from Pulpstream!
