People and Risk
People and Risk
Business is risky; the less static the more risk, thus the more successful the business the more risk in must embrace and benefit from. In this article, Lisette Howlett shares her thoughts and experiences in the area of risk and people. Without people you have less risk; but you also have no business. Risk is unavoidable but not insurmountable. Indeed taking your people risk seriously will improve your business; the successful management of risk has a positive impact on business success.
Proactively identifying your organisations' people risks give you the opportunity to make improvements that prevent problems arising. There is an additional benefit in that it also signals to employees that you mean it when you say that ‘your people are your greatest asset’ and this in itself addresses many of the potential areas of risk.
What are the top business threats?
When the Corporate Executive Programme asked its members to identify the risks that pose the biggest threat the top two were:
1. Bird Flu pandemic
2. Global Terrorism
These are both well publicised current concerns but warrant a further look. They also draw attention to key areas of ‘normal’ business where, managing people risks, offers business opportunities. By extrapolating into this area, considerable benefit can be realised. Let’s consider each in turn and identify some of the people risk implications and potential solutions:
The most obvious people risk for Bird Flu is around absenteeism – either due to a pandemic itself, or the fear of exposure to a potential pandemic.
o What contingency plans do you have for dealing with sudden and very high levels of absenteeism?
o What about your plans for a state imposed quarantine?
o Do you have policies in place for dealing with people who refuse to come to work in case they get infected?
Applying the learning to current management practices:
o How effective are you managers at managing absenteeism?
o Do you measure the cost of absence today and its impact on profits, business reputation, customer satisfaction, etc?
These and many other questions need to be addressed. The effectiveness with which you address them will impact both on the costs and also the benefits.
Managing these and all other people related risks gives you the opportunity for competitive advantage.
Looking at Terrorism and related crises including loss of key employees.
o How strong are your business contingency processes?
o Do you have a mechanism to contact all your employees at short notice?
You may benefit from taking a systematic look at your processes and putting in place best practice solutions. Your approach needs also to address some of the broader implications such as dealing with international mobility (which is strongly impacted by the fear of terrorist attacks).
Applying these risks to ‘everyday business’ raises the question about your ability to retain key employees (and if necessary replace them). Employee motivation is key to retention. Studies all show that pay is not the prime reason for losing employees. Success is assured by the adoption of an holistic approach to employee retention – understanding and addressing underlying causes in a way that improves your employee productivity as well as retention. It is also good practice to develop contingency plans for dealing with the loss of critical staff. Once again, the costs of good management practice and prevention are significantly lower than the cost of dealing with the problem itself.
Tackling People Risk
As with any business project a planned, step-wise approach will give you the best results. First establish the business drivers and imperatives – is this to address a specific issue or concern? Or do you want to seek to overhaul your approach in order to gain competitive advantage? Ensure that you balance your efforts between benefit realization and compliance – both are essential for sustained improvement.
People and Risk - To learn more about this author, visit Lisette Howlett's Website.
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A risky business …
Business is risky; the less static the more risk, thus the more successful the business the more risk in must embrace and benefit from. In this article, Lisette Howlett shares her thoughts and experiences in the area of risk and people. Without people you have less risk; but you also have no business. Risk is unavoidable but not insurmountable. Indeed taking your people risk seriously will improve your business; the successful management of risk has a positive impact on business success.
Proactively identifying your organisations' people risks give you the opportunity to make improvements that prevent problems arising. There is an additional benefit in that it also signals to employees that you mean it when you say that ‘your people are your greatest asset’ and this in itself addresses many of the potential areas of risk.
What are the top business threats?
When the Corporate Executive Programme asked its members to identify the risks that pose the biggest threat the top two were:
1. Bird Flu pandemic
2. Global Terrorism
These are both well publicised current concerns but warrant a further look. They also draw attention to key areas of ‘normal’ business where, managing people risks, offers business opportunities. By extrapolating into this area, considerable benefit can be realised. Let’s consider each in turn and identify some of the people risk implications and potential solutions:
The most obvious people risk for Bird Flu is around absenteeism – either due to a pandemic itself, or the fear of exposure to a potential pandemic.
o What contingency plans do you have for dealing with sudden and very high levels of absenteeism?
o What about your plans for a state imposed quarantine?
o Do you have policies in place for dealing with people who refuse to come to work in case they get infected?
Applying the learning to current management practices:
o How effective are you managers at managing absenteeism?
o Do you measure the cost of absence today and its impact on profits, business reputation, customer satisfaction, etc?
These and many other questions need to be addressed. The effectiveness with which you address them will impact both on the costs and also the benefits.
Managing these and all other people related risks gives you the opportunity for competitive advantage.
Looking at Terrorism and related crises including loss of key employees.
o How strong are your business contingency processes?
o Do you have a mechanism to contact all your employees at short notice?
You may benefit from taking a systematic look at your processes and putting in place best practice solutions. Your approach needs also to address some of the broader implications such as dealing with international mobility (which is strongly impacted by the fear of terrorist attacks).
Applying these risks to ‘everyday business’ raises the question about your ability to retain key employees (and if necessary replace them). Employee motivation is key to retention. Studies all show that pay is not the prime reason for losing employees. Success is assured by the adoption of an holistic approach to employee retention – understanding and addressing underlying causes in a way that improves your employee productivity as well as retention. It is also good practice to develop contingency plans for dealing with the loss of critical staff. Once again, the costs of good management practice and prevention are significantly lower than the cost of dealing with the problem itself.
Tackling People Risk
As with any business project a planned, step-wise approach will give you the best results. First establish the business drivers and imperatives – is this to address a specific issue or concern? Or do you want to seek to overhaul your approach in order to gain competitive advantage? Ensure that you balance your efforts between benefit realization and compliance – both are essential for sustained improvement.
People and Risk - To learn more about this author, visit Lisette Howlett's Website.
Like this article? Share it with your friends
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Dianne CramptonDianne Crampton is an executive leadership coach, team culture consultant, author and president of TIGERS Success Series, Inc. Dianne has been helping CEO's and Executives connect their employees to their core values and goals for over 20 years using the trademarked TIGERS team culture process, which stands for trust, interdependence, genuineness, empathy, risk and success. To download a free white paper on behaviors that build strong teams and behaviors that will predictably tear them down go here. Dianne's contribution to the 2010 Pfeiffer Consulting Journal (an imprint of John Wiley and Sons Publishers) entitled TIGERS Hearted Teams is available in November 2009. Her new book TIGERS Among Us: 5 Winning Business Team Cultures And Why, Three Creeks Publishing will release in March 2010. To receive publishing discounts, subscribe to the free TigerTracks Newsletter here. - Visit Dianne Crampton's Website |
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Anne BarrAnne Barr has over 26 years experience in sales and marketing, six years as a franchisee. She has assisted over 367 business owners and purchasers to achieve their goals in career change, transition and exit strategy. She holds the designation of Certified Franchise Executive from the International Franchise Association, Certified Business Intermediary from the International Business Brokers Association and Board Certified Broker from the Texas Association of Business Brokers. Anne is active in professional organizations, networking groups and volunteers for non-profit entities. As owner/operator of four successful businesses, Anne has proven people skills and enjoys helping clients find the right "fit" in business ownership. Visit www.FranchiseOpportunitySpecialist.com for more information about me and my company. - Visit Anne Barr's Website |
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Jeff FosterWebBizIdeas.com is a Minneapolis website design company founded to help people start an internet business by providing them with website, business, and internet resources that help foster the growth of successful online businesses and develop innovative Internet business ideas. We specialize in internet consulting & internet marketing. - Visit Jeff Foster's Website |
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John BrennanJohn Brennan Ed.D. Dr. Brennan is President of Interpersonal Development, LLC, a training and development firm. Interpersonal Development has provided sales training and coaching to more than 3,000 sales reps from over 100 companies. A native of Australia, Dr. Brennan received his doctorate from the University of Rochester. His dissertation researched the effectiveness of Behavioral Modeling Technology in training people in interpersonal skills. While he has spent most of his career designing or delivering training, he was also a Vice-President of Sales of a training and development franchise with operations in 25 markets. Dr. Brennan has designed and delivered sales training in North America, Asia, Europe, Australia and the Middle East. He has been a guest speaker at numerous national and regional professional conferences. When Microsoft wanted Best Practices articles on sales for their web site, they called Dr. Brennan. The results are at http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/FX011387391033.aspx His firm’s clients have included Volvo, The Prudential, Merrill Lynch, Eastman Kodak, Gannett, Equifax Europe, the Economist Group and countless small businesses. - Visit John Brennan's Website |
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Stephanie RobeyStephanie Robey is President and CoFounder of Pivot Positive, LLC - an Internet marketing business focused on helping people start work at home ventures. Previously, she was employed at The Search Agency with over 20 years experience in graphic design and 10 years experience in online marketing. She was responsible for launching the Conversion Path Optimization (CPO) unit where she and her team have conducted hundreds of optimization tests for online companies across multiple verticals. She is a successful entrepreneur having started and sold 2 companies and remains on the board of directors of the third, PhotoSpin.com Stephanie began her career in the direct marketing realm creating and producing direct mail for many of the major cable television companies and directly attributes her understanding of Internet marketing to those early offline experiences. Stephanie is a graduate of San Diego State University with a BFA in Graphic Arts and also holds an Executive MBA from the Graziadio School of Business and Management at Pepperdine University. Read Steph's Blog Meet Steph and Dave Sign up for our Free 7-Day BootCamp: Self Employed & Rich - Visit Stephanie Robey's Website |
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