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About Risk
Risk is the
possibility
of experiencing harm or loss.
Risks have to do with exposure
to uncertain changes. A change
is always a risk. This is the reason in compliance we always
authorize, test and document changes.
People take risks for
a good reason: To profit, to change their life, to try another
approach that is more promising. They take risks in the hope of a
favorable outcome.
The
four stages of the Risk Process
1. Risk Identification
2. Risk Analysis
3. Risk
Planning (selection and implementation of countermeasures, when the
risks are above our risk appetite)
4. Implementation of
countermeasures, monitoring, reporting and reviewing Risk Management
actions against objectives
According to the Stanford
Encyclopedia of Philosophy, in non-technical contexts, the word risk
refers, often rather vaguely, to situations in which it is possible
but not certain that some undesirable event will occur.
In
technical contexts, the word has several more specialized uses and
meanings.
Five of these are particularly important since
they are widely used across disciplines:
1.
risk =
an unwanted event which may or may not occur.
An example of
this usage is: “Lung cancer is one of the major risks that affect
smokers.”
2. risk =
the cause of an unwanted event which may or may not occur.
An
example of this usage is: “Smoking is by far the most important
health risk in industrialized countries.” (The unwanted event
implicitly referred to here is a disease caused by smoking.) Both
(1) and (2) are qualitative senses of risk. The word also has
quantitative senses, of which the following is the oldest one:
3. risk =
the probability of an unwanted event which may or may not occur.
This usage is exemplified by the following statement: “The risk
that a smoker's life is shortened by a smoking-related disease is
about 50%.”
4. risk =
the statistical expectation value of an unwanted event which may or
may not occur.
The expectation value of a possible negative
event is the product of its probability and some measure of its
severity.
It is common to use the number of killed persons
as a measure of the severity of an accident.
With this
measure of severity, the “risk” (in sense 4) associated with a
potential accident is equal to the statistically expected number of
deaths.
Other measures of severity give rise to other
measures of risk.
Although expectation values have been
calculated since the 17th century, the use of the term “risk” in
this sense is relatively new. Today it is the standard technical
meaning of the term “risk” in many disciplines. It is regarded by
some risk analysts as the only correct usage of the term.
5.
risk =
the fact that a decision is made under conditions of known
probabilities (“decision under risk” as opposed to “decision under
uncertainty”).
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How to assess the risks in your
workplace
from the Health and Safety Executive - HSE
(UK)
Follow the five steps
1.Identify the hazards
2.Decide who might be harmed and how
3.Evaluate the
risks and decide on precaution
4.Record your findings and
implement them
5.Review your assessment and update if
necessary
Don’t overcomplicate the process. In many
organisations, the risks are well known and the necessary
control measures are easy to apply.
You probably already
know whether, for example, you have employees who move heavy
loads and so could harm their backs, or where people are most
likely to slip or trip. If so, check that you have taken
reasonable precautions to avoid injury.
When thinking
about your risk assessment, remember:
A hazard is
anything that may cause harm, such as chemicals, electricity,
working from ladders, an open drawer, etc; and the risk is the
chance, high or low, that somebody could be harmed by these and
other hazards, together with an indication of how serious the
harm could be.
What is a
hazard?
A hazard is anything with the potential to
cause harm e.g. working at height on scaffolding.
What is risk?
A risk is the
likelihood that a hazard will cause a specified harm to someone
or something, eg if there are no guard rails on the scaffolding
it is likely that a construction worker will fall and break a
bone.
What is risk
management?
Risk management is a process that involves
assessing the risks that arise in your workplace, putting
sensible health and safety measures in place to control them and
then making sure they work in practice.
What is risk assessment?
A
risk assessment is nothing more than a careful examination of
what, in your work, could cause harm to people, so that you can
weigh up whether you have taken enough precautions or should do
more to prevent harm.
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