How effective is your personal risk management strategy?

In business there is a high focus on risk; the things that can disrupt business operations and profitability and can include a variety of problems both internal and external. This includes risk assessment of conflict in the workplace. What if we applied those same processes to ourselves and our interactions and relationships in the workplace and how we react or deal with issues that arise?

Businesses work out all the things that can possibly go wrong and then develop a Risk Management plan which identifies these factors on a scale of minor to catastrophic. Then businesses develop strategies or controls, to apply in the event of something happening.  These controls minimise the impact of the potential problems and reduce their impact on the business to an acceptable or manageable risk level.

Most business owners know and understand their own business but occasionally they will seek outside help by asking someone with relevant expertise to review the business operations and help them identify and address risks.

How to create a process for you own personal risk management

Step 1:  Identify and analyse your personal environment

• How well do you know yourself?
• What things in your work environment make you happy and help you in your role?
• What things are happening around you that challenge and/or frustrate you in your role?
• Is there someone in your team or another team who “rubs you up the wrong way”?

These are the factors that may lead to conflict in your workplace.

Step 2: Create a personal risk assessment chart

If we plotted external and internal factors from step 1 above, within a risk framework and categorised them as minor to catastrophic, where does the balance lie for you? 

Step 3: Apply controls

A control is a step in your hazard management process. It involves finding a way to neutralise or reduce an identified risk.

Controls can be divided into four options:

• Accept Risk – you decide that he risk has the potential to deliver a gain or personal/professional growth and is acceptable.
• Mitigate Risk – you put strategies/actions in place to reduce the risk to an acceptable level.
• Eliminate Risk – you put strategies in place to reduce to the risk completely.
• Transfer Risk – you transfer the risk to another organisation or individual.

In considering your controls you may ask:

• Can you apply controls to situations or influences, and to yourself, to reduce any negative effects to manageable levels and avoid possible conflict situations?
• Is there someone who can assist you and help apply those controls?

Step 4: Review whether your controls have helped

• Are they providing you with the required tools to manage your identified risks?
• How do your chosen coping strategies help you reduce any anxiety or stress? If they’re not reducing anxiety or stress, they need to be reviewed and appropriate changes made.

Coaching and mentoring as a control

Your controls could include asking for assistance from a coach or mentor within your workplace or external to your workplace. 

If you are struggling to work out how well you know yourself, perhaps an external coach/mentor is more appropriate for you and Blackforrest Consulting can help you with this.

A coach/mentor can help you identify your strengths and clarify challenges that disrupt your equilibrium. You can then use a strengths perspective to plot effective controls that you can utilise to protect you against any possible fallout when risks occur.

Love to explore this concept further – contact Blackforrest Consulting for your initial complimentary discussion.

Find this article interesting or helpful?

You might also find the following articles helpful:

• How does conflict affect people and productivity in your business?
• Personal story telling pivotal to building strong working relationships
• Sticks and stones may break my bones - What three phrases frustrate clear communication and lead to conflict?