Happy New Year; had a busy fall and I see I didn't get around to posting.

Two upcoming conference presentations this month, in both of which I'll focus on parallels between the private and pubic sectors with an emphasis on risk management on organizations that straddle that dividing line in terms of governance, and therefore decision processes and risk appetite.

• January 18, Canadian pension funds' risk managers' roundtable (invitation only, organized by the CPPIB), Toronto. I'm presenting on "hard to measure" risk, focus on macroeconomic and geopolitical investment risks.
  
• January  22, Risk management for the public sector, Ottawa. Panelist on risk management transformation programs; lessons learned from such programs at public and quasi-public institutions around the world.

I'm making two upcoming conference presentations, both keynote speeches, one followed by moderating an executive panel. I will hopefully will be able to post material soon afterwards; contact me if interested earlier.

• "Industry trends in risk management and their implications", Openlink NEXT conference, London UK, Sept 26. Focus is on trends such as VUCA, strategic vs merely trading/financial exposures, digital enterprise, and their implication for risk management and risk taking in the financial, energy, and commodity sectors.
• "Being a good risk coach rather than a hovering parent" followed by a facilitated leadership panel, onRisk 2017 (Ontario public sector risk management): The Intersections of Risk, Toronto, November 16.

Balanced Risk Strategies has changed web hosting providers. Content, including blog postings, have been fully copied over. Unfortunately, blog post comments (there were not many...) have not made the transition.

The good news is that the new provider has a much better blog platform, including commenting and spam protection.

If by chance you subscribed to this blog via an RSS feed, you will have to change it -- see the RSS button at right. Apologies for the inconvenience.

Co-presenting a GARP webcast on the above topic with Brenda Boultwood (MetricStream; former CRO, Constellation Energy) on Nov. 18. Continuing education credit available. 

UPDATE Dec 3: The webcast is available for streaming for the next several months at the GARP site​. Registration is required for access.

​Once again at the Cambridge Cetre for Risk Studies Annual Conference, in my opinion regularly the most thoughtful and idea-filled cross-sector risk conference out there. This year, fascinating and a bit sad to see how everyone recognizes how stress testing needs to be more strategic, better genuinely integrated into decisionmaking. But very few have the time/energy to try to make it happen. Conference blow-by-blow on Twitter #camrisk2015 (including my own attempts to become a Twitterer)

 Varied and enthusiastic crowd yesterday at Rotman for my talk on ERM across sectors. 

A video of the presentation is available at the Rotman media browser and the slides (which are puny in the video) can be downloaded here: 20150601 Pergler ERM Rotman.pdf.

In addition, Rotman have posted a short excerpt on YouTube​, though the editor somehow chose only a clip about financial services, which was actually only a minor part of the talk.

Presenting on this topic at the Rotman (University of Toronto) Master of Finance Speaker Series, 5:30pm June 1.

CFA CE credit eligible.

Presenting as invited speaker on the above topic at the 3rd Kuwait ERM conference on March 30. Very important topic -- in my opinion stress testing is a crucial but still not very systematically discussed topic in the nonfinancial sector. And the interplay of "business as usual" risk modeling (e.g. cash flow at risk models), scenarios, and stress testing is an important part of framing robust risk management.

Update Apr 8, 2015: Presentation is available for download at the conference site​

Risk management is a shared responsibility of everyone in a company, not the exclusive domain of risk managers. 

What can treasurers in particular do to improve overall risk management, beyond pure treasury risks? Continuing my collaboration with the AFP, I am part of a panel speaking on this topic this Thursday (Feb 12) in an AFP webinar, "How can Treasury lead ERM?"​

​For a similar perspective on the role of the CFO, rather than the Treasurer, see my working paper (with Will Liu), Role of the CFO in risk management​. There are both commonalities as well as specificities by role (and of course my thinking has evolved in the intervening 2 years...)

A presentation I made at the AFP (Association of Financial Professionals) Executive Institute in Washington DC this past November has been quoted/excerpted in Crisis Management: The First 72 Hours (gtnews.com).​  The presentation was with my friend and colleague Becca O'Brien, a crisis expert with extensive public and private sector experience, and included an exciting crisis simulation developed by McKinsey.​

Of course, crisis response and resilience is only part of the story. Equally important is crisis preparedness, and (as much as possible) crisis avoidance through effective risk management. That's a topic for another day.