This management of risks and opportunities procedure can assist your business to comply with AS/NZS ISO 9001, Quality Management Systems clauses:
Risk and opportunity management is the proactive identification, assessment, and mitigation or exploitation of risks and opportunities. It is a continuous process that should be incorporated into an organization’s overall strategic planning and day-to-day operations.
Risk and opportunity management can help organizations achieve their objectives by:
By identifying and responding to risks and opportunities, businesses can protect themselves from potential threats and take advantage of growth opportunities.
By identifying and responding to opportunities and risks, businesses can take advantage of growth opportunities and protect themselves from potential threats.
In basic terms:
There are many ways to identify risks and opportunities. The key is to think creatively and be open to different possibilities. For any business, the identification of risks and opportunities is a critical activity at both the strategic and operational levels.
It needs to include all significant sources of risk, including those beyond the business’s control. Quite simply, if a risk, threat or opportunity is not identified, there can be no strategy to manage it.
The key objective of the identification step is not to create a difficult and lengthy list of all possible risks, but to identify all significant risks that could impact the business.
Opportunities and risks can be identified by:
Once identified, opportunities and risks should be recorded as part of the ‘context of the organization.’
The best way to manage risks and opportunities is to be proactive. Some risks can be easy to manage and will present an opportunity for your business to grow. Others will be more difficult to manage and could present a serious threat to your business.
An organization’s approach to managing risks and opportunities will vary depending on the size and type of business, the products or services it provides, and the sector in which it operates.
As mentioned, the most effective approach to managing opportunities and risks is to adopt a systematic and proactive approach, and this should be embedded into the culture of the business. One of the best ways to manage or reduce risks is to have an effective documented procedure in place to follow.
The overall aim of opportunity and risk management is to ensure that capabilities and resources are engaged in a manner to mitigate risks and take advantage of opportunities. Similarly, if you can identify opportunities and take advantage of them before your competitors you will be ahead of the ‘game.’
This 11-page AS/NZS ISO 9001 management of risks and opportunities procedure can assist you document the risk and opportunity processes, so you can: