“You’ve never done enough.”
That was the somewhat startling closing message from a senior charity lawyer at a day-long seminar on safeguarding that I attended recently. I heard something similar from an expert in crisis management, explaining how his action plan for responding to a variety of possible incidents was continually under review; always a work in progress and never regarded as the finished article.
The point, of course, of these two reflections, is that organisations need to be both prepared and flexible in their responses to the risks that they may face.
The starting point for those preparations is, naturally, to identify and understand what those risks are. A comprehensive Risk Register provides a framework for recording the risks and the steps taken to address them. Trustees are obliged to mitigate risks, to reduce their impact, even if not to eliminate them altogether. After all, if we could only work in a risk free environment, we couldn’t get anything done, let alone the often out-of-the-box activities that charities deliver.
Perhaps counter-intuitively, the sheer abundance of regulation that governs charities can actually help in getting on top of risk management. Much of the regulation takes the form of, or has given rise to, guidance documents produced by bodies such as the Charity Commission, the new Fundraising Regulator and the Information Commissioner’s Office (for Data protection issues).
The real challenge is in having the time, resources and expertise to establish a risk management process and then to keep it updated, with all of the relevant parties informed as to their duties and responsibilities – including trustees, but also staff and volunteers running the day-to-day activities of the charity.
Having the right personnel is essential, but so is realising that help can come from outside the organisation, and can be extremely cost effective. After all, it is the cost of not managing risk that is the most expensive in the long run.
For advice on risk management and on particular areas of regulation affecting charities, contact me on consultingmjb@gmail.com or on 07908 620 109.
