Approaches to Integrated Risk Management: A Multi-dimensional Framework

Abstract

Terms such as ‘integrated risk management’ and ‘enterprise-wide risk management’ are increasingly used to capture the notion of risk management embedded into all aspects of an organisation's activities. This paper argues that integrated risk management can be developed in six separable directions or dimensions:

• the interpretation of risk as threat, opportunity or uncertainty;

• the decisions to which risk management is applied;

• the purpose of the risk management activity;

• the nature of the process employed;

• the parties involved; and

• the resources applied.

Choices in each dimension indicate the ways in which organisations can incrementally develop risk management practices to the level of fully integrated risk management.