Global Risk Forum: Italian risk managers focus on post-pandemic scenarios

Which strategies and new risk management approaches will be developed in a post-pandemic scenario? This question was the starting point for the Global Risk Forum 2021, an annual event organised by Business International with the support of Anra, the Italian association of risk and insurance managers. Carlo Cosimi, president of Anra, explained: “The pandemic represented a disruptive event, but it also grounded us. It showed how the systemic risks that are reported every year in the Global Risk Report have always been underestimated. One of these is the pandemic, but we are still experiencing strong signs of many others, for example political instability, social movements, climate change.” According to Massimo Livatino, professor at Bocconi University and moderator of the event, somehow the pandemic did not represent a revolution but rather a strengthening of trends that were already evident. The first is that the companies best equipped in terms of processes and human resources to deal with disruptive changes are those that react best to emergencies and crises. Second, internal control systems and risk management procedures are useful even in moments of low stress and, indeed, these are the best moments to invest and work on it, added the professor. The pandemic has taught people and organisations that they must get used to thinking about bad and worst-case scenarios, and preparing for them. Although the pandemic has increased the visibility of risk management and risk managers generally, there are still steps to be taken to achieve full recognition of the profession, said Mr Levatino. The chief risk officer position is still not widely accepted as a c-level role, confusion often remains between the areas of risk management and those of internal audit, and some boards still do not recognise the strategic importance of enterprise risk management, which is sometimes still perceived and applied as an element of compliance. Finally, there is a lack of truly effective incentive methods for those who apply good risk management, he explained. However, it is possible to find examples of companies that know how to apply risk management in the right way, even those that operate in an area that has been in the eye of the storm in recent months, such as healthcare. This is the case with Astellas Pharma, a Japanese pharmaceutical company with a global presence, represented at the Global Risk Forum by Giuseppe Maduri, its general manager. The principles on which risk management has been based in the company are: cross-functionality and delegation, because “there is no sense in having committees and working groups if everything remains centralised at the top, and the culture of risk management is not widespread”, explained Mr Maduri. The next is accountability, which is the need for each person involved to have awareness of their role and be responsible for it. “The risk manager in this context is the pivot: they have a strategic role, not just a procedural role, and not all responsibility for the risk must fall on him or her. The CEOs themselves have to be supportive, being role models. They must be the first to respect and embody the values of the organisation, even in the area of risk management,” added Mr Maduri. Another best practice example used during the Global Risk Forum is that of Novartis, the Swiss multinational pharmaceutical company. “At Novartis, we have created an internal community, made up of about 60 people with different seniorities and skills, in which individual perspectives are shared and risks are discussed, and communicated to the board with a bottom-up perspective,” explained Marilena Arinisi, ethics, risk and compliance country head at Novartis. Closely related to risk management is the hot topic of sustainability, which concerns all types of organisations, even those that are enablers and builders of sustainability themselves. Giulio Ballarini, VP sales and country manager at Software AG, a provider of software infrastructure, started with a provocative question: “Is all this software that companies are implementing to raise sustainability really sustainable?” “In order to function, software needs to be applied to hardware, and this is where the problem begins. To work, the current blockchain system alone consumes an amount of energy equal to that needed by Switzerland. By 2040, 40% of global CO2 emissions will be linked to ICT companies,” explained Mr Ballarini. When creating and/or applying a new software system, organisations must therefore ask themselves what its long-term impacts will be and how much it will consume. “Today, data centres consume 2% of global energy, but it is estimated that, based on the current pace of cloud development, by 2030 they will consume about 30%,” added Mr Ballarini.

Global Risk Forum: Italian risk managers focus on post-pandemic scenarios

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